


Storm King

by slinden



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Child Abuse, Cutting, Dark fic, Eventual Romance, Hurt/Comfort, I watch too much Criminal Minds, Kidnapping, Murder, Sad with a Happy Ending, Self-Harm, Serial Killers, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, What even am I doing anymore, dark fic i guess?, excuse me while i shoe-horn qui-gon into everything he gets no love, kylo sleeps with someone else in ch 30 but it’s temporary and he feels bad, prospective chapter count 60 to 65, the Poe/Kylo chapters are chapters 17 to 27, there will be finn/rey chapters but i'm changing things and it won't be happy so just be prepared, there will be spoilers in the tags, yeah it's gonna get dark fam
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-31
Updated: 2019-11-26
Packaged: 2019-12-30 01:52:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 30
Words: 235,732
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18305765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slinden/pseuds/slinden
Summary: Two children are rescued from a kidnapper and murderer after years of torture and abuse. The oldest, formerly Ben Solo and now Kylo Ren, feels a desperate need to protect four-year-old Rey as they enter the freedom, as well as the new terrors, of the outside world. How will they recover from what they experienced? The years to come will challenge them both as the scars underneath refuse to heal.This is a modern-day AU that will follow Ben and Rey as they grow up and deal with what happened, as well as their feelings for one another and how they transform over time.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't posted in a while because of my workload (teaching, research, meetings, general despair about my career, etc.). Thought I'd let you guys know that my WIPs are not forgotten, but I needed to get something else going to get myself back into writing as I fight through exhaustion and general blahs. Maybe going into dark places isn't the best way to go but here we are :). Thanks for reading! I've really missed posting so hopefully I can keep pushing through everything that's going on right now!

 

Kylo Ren stared at the scratched patch of paint on the wall across the hospital room. It was a discoloured spot of pale green in a sea of ivory, rising up from another time to taint the present.

It was only about the size of a coin: a small scratch that no one else seemed to notice, but he did. The room had been quiet for an hour, the first silence that he could remember in years, but the damned spot was starting to scream at him over the dull buzz of the overhead lights. His dark head tilted as he felt himself getting drawn into the green. The edges slowly started to blur as he focused on the infuriating blemish, spreading and growing in a way that paint couldn’t. The colour started to spill over its confines and bled strings of disruption across the blank expanse that filled his vision. It thrummed with his pulse, seemingly want to draw him in to touch it.

He blinked hard and glared, finally swimming up from numbness back to rage. Someone scratched the damned wall and hadn’t bothered to fix it.

People who were free to do whatever they wanted never worried about taking care of what they had.

“Why’re you looking at the wall?”

The tiny voice in the bed next to him broke his trance and the expanse of the web contracted in a snap, leaving only the obscure and unnoticeable green dot.

He forced his face to be neutral when he looked down at Rey’s wide, yet tired, brown eyes. She yawned and looked from him to the wall, before meeting his eyes again.

That morning the police had told him she was about four years old. That morning, they were wrapped in blankets and put in the back of an ambulance. That morning, for the first time in seven years, he left the horrors of his captivity. That morning, he heard the sounds of their captor choke out his last hateful breath as he beat him to death.

That morning, they were free.

Looking into her eyes made it all wash over him again and he took a shaky breath before finally answering.

“Couldn’t sleep.”

She yawned again and took his hand. “Why?”

He settled into the bed next to her and traced her hospital bracelet with his free hand. The flimsy plastic band sat loosely over the now-hardened cast for her broken arm. Hours ago he’d raged at the nurses about the name on that band. They put Jane Doe, even though he insisted that her name was Rey. He only stopped fighting when he saw the tears in her eyes and took a slow step back to drop his head and let the nurses win.

Shrugging, he let the bracelet go. “It’s too quiet.”

Her small face was solemn. “No screaming.”

He didn’t want her to cry again. It hurt too much. The entire day had been overwhelming. The ecstasy of being free rapidly faded into disillusionment of basically being in another prison. This one wasn’t haunted by an abusive murderer, but instead guarded by police, doctors, and social workers.

He had forgotten how many people there were in the world and now it seemed like they were meeting them all at once.

Kylo didn’t want to believe he’d been gone for seven years. That would make him fourteen — half of his life had been stolen from him and all of Rey’s life had been spent in that hell. Even in the clean and hushed hospital room, he could still feel the pressure and pain well in his chest at how fucking unfair everything was. But just the brief spark of selfishness on his part pulled the corner of his mouth into a frown. He’d only been able to save her. He had let the other kids down and now they were the only ones left.

Even in the big world that they’d escaped into, everything still felt so small.

He felt weak in both of them.

“You need to sleep,” he said, lowering his voice. “It’s late.”

He used to hold her in the dirty corner of the sleeping room and could always talk her to sleep. He'd tell her stories that he could remember from his past and she'd smile brightly before cuddling closer and finally resting. He would spend the rest of those nights resisting sleep to keep watch on the door. Anytime one of the others moved or cried, he was worried that the terror would come down on them again. She used to be covered in dirt and blood. He could still almost taste it when he inhaled the scent of her hair. 

“But you’re not sleeping,” Rey answered, even as her eyelids started to drift shut. They’d had to reset her arm before putting on the cast. The doctors had looked on in horror as she didn’t flinch at any of the needles or prodding. He would have smiled if he’d felt anything in that moment. She'd been like that the entire day, even when he'd scooped her up from the floor and made his break for the door. But there was no reason to smile at the carnage he'd left behind in that crimson-stained horror compound.

He'd fought so hard not to react around her. Now, all he could feel was a growing need to scream or cry. The feeling to run started to crawl up his throat; he never should have flagged down that stranger on the lonely dirt road. He should have just kept running. The only mistake he hadn't made that day was killing Snoke, a man whose cruelty sunk below horror and existed in a space of hollow evil. He would suck in the screams and turn them into a vicious energy to consume more blood, tears, and torn flesh. Just the flash of the man's dying eyes in his head made his urge to flee grow. Otherwise, he would break everything in the room. His hands started to quiver as he pulled away.

“I need to go ask the nurses something,” he replied. “You’re safe here and I’ll be right back.”

He’d fought to stick by her side the entire day, but he was too restless to stay in that room. Rey had insisted that they leave the lights on and it was hurting his eyes. The buzz from the lights was angrily scratching at his ears as well.

And that damned spot was staring back at him from the corner of his eye.

Rey seemed to shrug and accept it. She trusted him too deeply and knew that he’d return.

“Be back soon, Kylo.”

Her words were soft and sleepy as he eased himself off of the high hospital bed. It was hers but he didn’t want her to sleep alone. His bed was empty across the room. The police had questioned them late into the evening, he guessed. He remembered the sting of the sunshine on his face. It wasn't the first time he'd felt the sun and breathed in the grassy tones of fresh air, but it was the first breath he took without fearing being shot in the back for stepping out of line. He'd grabbed Rey tighter and achingly moved down the driveway into the future. The sharp stones stung his bare and bleeding feet but he still ran even though the old man was dead. 

The memories were getting jumbled now because all he could think about was running right back into hell, her in tow. 

As his bare feet hit the cool floor, he had to take a long, deep breath to steady himself. He had forgotten what linoleum felt like after walking on dirt and wood for seven years. It was smooth and slippery and too clean. Any spec of dirt seemed to dig into his skin as he walked quietly across the room. Real pain came from something one couldn't see, not the open would of being violated and destroyed from the inside out.

He slipped on the slippers they’d given him and took one last glance at Rey before pushing the door open.

His hand stilled after it swung open an inch.

He could freely open a door.

There was a lock, clearly, but it was just a single lock. It wasn’t rows of rusty and heavy padlocks.

He could just get up and go out into the hallway.

His hand fell back and the door slid from his hand. The door scratched at the floor, loosely swinging back into place. He could hear his own breathing again when it slid to the frame. Just looking at the floor outside made his heartbeat quicken. He took a slow step back and just stared at the large window in the centre of the pale orange door. It wasn’t blocked; he could clearly see out. 

People had come in and out of that room all evening and he couldn't do it. 

Frustration took over and he quickly pushed his way out of the room, violently hitting the door. He would force himself to get used to this for Rey. She had no idea what the outside world looked like. He had to make it through his own fears to prevent the darkness from getting to her.

A tired-looking police officer sat in a chair outside their room. They were being watched once again. Even as he narrowed his eyes, the cop sat up a little and quirked his head at him.

Kylo felt his legs stiffen again and he dropped his head.

“Something the matter?” The officer asked.

His mouth wouldn’t work and the slippers were too small for his feet.

“Kid?”

He took a ragged breath, hearing his back teeth clack together as he steadied his jaw.

“Needtogoforwalk.” It all came out as one hasty word. Exhaling sharply out of his nose, he met the man’s eyes just to prove to himself that he could do it. “I need to take a walk. Can I go to the nurse’s station?”

The officer looked confused but then nodded. “Sure. Do you know where it is?”

“Yes,” he answered quickly. Then he paused, still making himself look at the other man. “Rey is asleep.”

“Want me to check on her?”

He shook his head instantly. “No, no. She’s still not used to other people.”

The officer, still with his puzzled expression, nodded. Kylo snapped his eyes away and started down the hall to the nurses.

He didn’t really need to go there. He just wanted to go somewhere.

His feet slowed as he neared the first corner. He still kept waiting for Snoke to jump around every wall and drag him back into the darkness.

Kylo again looked at his uncomfortable slippers as the brightness from his hallway clashed with the dim lighting around the corner.

Pursing his lips, he forced himself to get through the area and continue towards the station.

Snoke was dead. He couldn’t come back for him. He’d killed him. He had finally been strong enough to stand up to him and…

“Do you need something?”

He blinked and realized that he’d reached where he had wanted to go. His body had worked even when his mind didn’t.

But there had already been too many questions today and he wanted to snap at the voice that greeted him. He swallowed it and shook his head.

The young nurse sat up and looked at him with gentle eyes. He still didn’t want to know what time it was, but with the lack of running feet and quickly exchanged words, he knew it was night. The station had a brightly toned desk with small toys sitting on a soft-pink countertop. The nurse was wearing magenta. He surprised himself by remembering the names to colours he hadn’t seen in years.

“Can I have some juice?” He needed to ask something to avoid looking stupid. The nurse was looking at him like he was a broken idiot. His excuse was bullshit, but at least it was something.

She smiled brightly, setting her book down. “Of course. You can wait right here.”

She disappeared into a side room, leaving him alone in the large, empty space. The lights were dimmed in the waiting area on the other side of the station. There were no visitors. It was late at night. The world was asleep, still forgetting that they existed. 

Except for some.

He eyed the distant door that led to the elevators and thought again about running.

He’d made a mistake with one of the police earlier. She was a pushy detective that had threatened to keep him from Rey until he told her who he was. He had hated her and her awful blonde hair the second she had pushed her way into the room and now that hatred again cracked through his mind.

He told them his real name. His parents were coming.

But he’d been Kylo Ren now for as long as he was Ben Solo.

Narrowing his eyes at the door, he slowly clenched his hand into a fist.

The quick return of the nurse made him jump back and stumble. He didn't think it was that bad but her hand came to her mouth and she apologized. He still stared wildly at her as he fought to get his heart under control.

“I’m so sorry,” she said. “Here’s some apple juice. The next time you need something, you can use the call button in your room, okay?”

He saw his hands shake as he took the cool bottle. Avoiding touching her hand was the hardest part.

Retreating without another word, he heard Snoke’s voice in his head as he took furious strides back to their room. He was _worthless_ ; he was _damaged_ ; his parents clearly didn’t want him because he was _weak_ and _stupid_ enough to be caught in the first place.

He ignored the police officer and entered his room again.

Rey was still asleep.

He wanted to scream, but instead let his hand tighten around the bottle. He couldn’t wake her up.

The juice was too sweet as he took two long clunks. He winced at the taste and then closed the lid before tossing it onto his empty bed. As gently as he could, he crawled back into bed with Rey. She whimpered and pulled him closer as he lifted the light sheet over them both.

Forcing his eyes closed, he felt the gentle rhythm of her heartbeat against his chest.

She had been the reason he survived the last four years. Before Snoke brought her into the compound, he was a numb body, existing just for another beating, assault or the other brutalities that he could dream up from his rotten mind. Snoke took Rey out of a rage at him and his unwillingness to respond to his torment. The grizzled old man had ripped off one of Kylo’s fingernails and he’d hardly reacted. He'd hardly flinched as the wrinkled hand brought the pliers down onto the next finger. There was pain, he remembered dully, but he didn’t really feel it. It was another drop into the void. He didn't realize why Snoke had pushed him aside and left suddenly. When he stumbled back to the others, they were mostly grateful that he'd taken the brunt of the anger again. He'd stared at them and nodded before sitting down and letting his eyes blur until he must have fallen asleep. The next day, an infant appeared and Kylo knew that it was his fault. Another child had been taken because of him; that hadn't happened before, when he'd obeyed and cried and screamed. Snoke had just taken children at whim before but that was a message. He had to behave, but he also had to get her out of there.

It took him four years, but he’d done it.

But what was he supposed to do now?

The thought kept him awake until exhaustion finally started to pull him down into an uncomfortable sleep. This wasn't huddled in a corner until his shoulders grew stiff. This wasn't stealing minutes on a floor that was tainted with the scent of blood. This was a place where they should be and feel safe. He should be happy. Instead, he didn't know where that feeling came from anymore. He knew how it looked: he saw it on the face of the police and the doctors and everyone else that had paraded in and out of their room in the last hours. He also knew how it looked every time that Rey looked at him. But for some reason, he couldn't find his happiness in the dark swirls of his mind as he reached for rest that his body desperately needed.

His first free sleep in years would be spent in a hospital bed, protecting a young girl who had ended up where she was because of him and his mistakes. Hugging Rey closer to him as he finally started to drift off, his last thoughts were about why his parents never did the same for him.

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo deals with the dawn of the first day of freedom and reconnecting with people who he thought had forgotten him: his parents, and his best childhood friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am finally feeling better again and getting back into writing! More chapters are coming here and to my other things. I can’t tell you guys how much I missed writing here. I really hope that I can keep working through the stuff that is bringing me down and give you guys more! Thanks for the comments so far! I am actually writing this on my iPad with a Bluetooth keyboard that keeps switching languages between French, English, and Swedish so sorry if some of the punctuation gets wonky...

 

They were watched while they ate breakfast. A woman with pursed pale lips and sharp eyes kept her distance, but Kylo felt her gaze like a needle underneath his skin. It prodded him every time she exhaled. That meant she was going to speak and all he wanted was silence. 

A nurse had checked on them early that morning, just after dawn, and he sank into an instant foul mood at the reactions of the adults around him. Everyone was questioning them. No one was really helping them.

After showering and dressing in the soft pyjamas given to them to wander around in, they crawled back into bed and managed to fall asleep again. 

Then, the meal had been wheeled in and he had reacted without thinking. It had taken only one or two breaths and he was moving. The two hospital staff had gawked at him as he had pulled sleeping Rey off the bed to the corner, to shield her from an attack that wasn’t coming. It was only when Rey smelled the food that she gently tapped him out of his panicked stupor.

His hands loosened and he realized that his knuckles were tinged white.

How was he supposed to be normal? He needed to get them out of there and he was still acting like everyone was going to hurt them.

He had finally stood up and instantly looked at his feet.

That was when the woman trailed in and started making notes as they sat together on the bed. They’d slept there that night like that because Rey had cried lightly when he had left her for a few minutes to stare at the mirror and understand what he was now. It was the memory of his own hazy eyes that made him look up and look around him again. He heard her underlining something on her stacks of paper as he started helping Rey rather than instantly digging into his food. The doctors had told him that despite how tall and strong he was—and he knew he was strong because he’d killed Snoke—he was underweight. He’d eat eventually, when everything being served to them stopped tasting so overwhelmingly saccharine.

The woman shifted and he was drawn from his memories back into the room and her prickly presence.

“Why aren’t you eating?” She asked again. 

He squinted at her. “Not hungry.”

Rey was happily picking up the sticky pancakes that he was cutting up for her. She didn’t question where the food came from or who the woman was, at least not openly. Whenever they were alone, they would talk. It was a relief not to whisper and to hear her voice and how perfect she spoke. Whenever Snoke was out, he’d try to teach her terms and concepts that he remembered; she had to go to school when they got out and couldn’t look stupid like he did when he was a child. Now, however, at the dawn of the first full day of freedom, she would revert back to the silent language that all of the children had developed over the years whenever there was someone else in the room. Communicating by blinking was quite often the only way to get through some nights without being punished. They had tried using hand signals or touches, but Snoke would figure them out. He never caught on to the blinking. Or maybe he had and just ignored it for the bigger plans that he had for them.

The idiot across from him hadn’t figured it out either. And he hoped that she never would.

She was some sort of therapist or psychologist. He hadn’t been listening when she came in behind the breakfast trays. He knew that there would be more names and faces throughout the day and had woken up in an awful mood because of it. His adrenaline still hadn’t faded from his earlier instincts to protect Rey. Just looking at the food made his stomach harden.  
He finally gave up and picked up a single grape, glaring at the woman as he popped it into his mouth.

She scribbled something down and he clenched his teeth.

“Are the pancakes good, Rey?” She asked, focusing on her again. Look for the weaker one, as Snoke would say. “What do they taste like?”

Rey quirked her head and turned to him first, asking what she should say. He blinked back, giving her the simplest answer.  
He was smart enough to know that they would have to be there a long time. The whispers between the police and the doctors had already led him down that path. They had to act like they weren’t broken, even though he knew better in the back of his mind. Rey had never been outside and he was stubbornly ignoring the fact that every distant sound from the hallway made him twitch or jump. 

Rey turned to the woman and shrugged. “Sweet. I like them.”

“That’s good. What else is sweet?”

“Juice. Fruit.” Rey returned to eating after her answer. He started cutting up his portion for her and let her enjoy the treat. He had to keep himself from snapping the flimsy cutlery as he edged through the soft cakes. The nanny used to make pancakes every Sunday for him. Tasting them now would bring back even more memories that he didn’t want to have.

“Candy is also sweet,” the woman said. “Maybe we can have some candy later.”

Rey didn’t answer the baited question. Kylo could tell that the woman was waiting for them to answer something about the compound or their captor. She knew full well that Rey had never had candy before and it cemented his resentment towards the leading questions that the woman posed and her in general. 

It was strange to hate someone new. But it was also freeing.

He could hate again.

She stopped her questioning after a while and turned to flipping through papers and forms, checking off random boxes and sighing whenever she caught Kylo’s eyes boring into her. Eventually, she gave up and left them alone. 

The next face was one of the detectives from last night. She reintroduced herself as Phasma and sat down on the now-vacated chair. Kylo’s shoulders stiffened at her reappearance. 

“We’re going to go to the playroom, if you’d like, now that you’re done your breakfast,” she said, her voice light but Kylo could see that they didn’t have an option. “We have many more questions for you, but it’s a good idea for you to relax first.”

“Will there be other children there?” He asked. Then, he dropped his head and added a second part, pressed by her eyes. “I’ve heard them,” he said, looking back at her again.

Phasma tilted her blonde head and pursed her lips before speaking. “Would you like other children to be there?”

This was another trick. He was being given a choice. “Maybe later.”

“That sounds good. Would you like to come with me?”

He didn’t. But he went anyway.

They passed by now-opened doors to other rooms. There were curious eyes following them and their entourage of uniformed police officers. He had to keep his head down to avoid catching a face that reminded him of someone who would still be alive if he wasn’t so stupid.

The sun shone brightly in the playroom. Rey’s hand tightened in his at the sight of toys, playground equipment, and a television set mounted to the wall. She looked up at him and almost blinked too rapidly for him to catch what she meant. He finally gave her a small smile, the first one that felt real, and nodded.

She gently took her hand from his and strode confidently up to the plastic bin of dolls and play clothes. He lulled by the door before following after, sitting on a low plastic slide to watch her. The police lurked by the doorway, but he focused on Rey. She could finally play. 

He made her a doll when she was three. He’d pulled out and saved clumps of his hair, combining them with scraps of forgotten and ripped cloth he’d pocketed. It was small enough to hide in one of the holes they’d scratched into one of the walls. 

She cherished it. 

And had named it Kylo.

Snoke found it, burnt it, and tossed the hot ashes in her face.

The vision made him shudder and he caught Phasma’s frown. That made him lower himself from the red, plastic slide down onto the carpeted floor. Rey had sorted out the dolls and clothes into neat piles and was counting them, awkwardly moving her broken arm as she completed her task.

“There are too many,” she frowned. “Why too many?”

He picked up one of the soft, fabric dolls and tried to come up with an answer. “The children here are sick. They need things to help them feel better.”

“Doesn’t, um,” he watched Rey work out the word and caught the line of frustration that creased her forehead, “medicines do that?”

He wanted to smile but the eyes of the police made him only quirk his lips slightly. It hurt not to be proud of her. “That’s for their bodies. This is for…everything else.”

She nodded and reached for the doll in his hand. “It’s still too many.”

Kylo watched Rey dressing and redressing the dolls for a few minutes before he noticed how the police officers, detective Phasma included, kept looking through the open door and into the hallway, before glancing down at their phones. The small bricks in their hands intrigued him. He vaguely remembered how his mother would let him watch videos or play games on her device. But he also saw her speaking on it, barking orders or rolling her eyes at something. But that one had been small. When did they get so big? 

That’s when he heard the distant echo of his mother’s voice.

When Rey’s head lifted, he knew it wasn’t just in his head. 

He reached for her and she instantly went into his arms. Anytime he moved with determination, it only meant bad things. Even though the police were watching him, he spurned their gazes and went to sit in the large chair in the corner. He had Rey in his lap and his eyes on the door. He didn’t want to be sitting on the floor when he saw them again.

The clattering of shoes and nearing of voices drummed on his ears. They seemed to match his rapid heartbeat, filling up his senses until he could only hear his own breathing. White clouded the corners of his eyes as he stared at the floor, willing himself to disappear into it.

“Ben!”

He didn’t look up. It was his father’s voice. A shiver coursed through his body and he sunk down further into the chair.

“Ben? We’re here. Oh my God, we can’t believe it. You’re here. You’re safe.”

Now his mother’s voice joined the first. 

He heard them step forward and he turned his head to the side and shut his eyes. 

If they were there, he’d have to leave with them. 

None of this should be happening. He could take care of everything. He already had and always would.

He heard the detective clear her throat. “They’ve been through a lot. Give them time.”

“Who’s the girl? We heard about her, but have you found her parents?” His father spoke and he hugged Rey closer.

“She’s mine,” Kylo finally shouted. “She doesn’t have any parents.”

Phasma sighed heavily. “We should go talk somewhere else…”

“No!” He snapped, finally turning to look at them as Rey squirmed in his lap. His stomach turned as he looked at his parents.

They weren’t the same; they were supposed to be the same. Strands of grey arched through their hair and he saw lines that he didn’t remember. He didn’t know them. He wasn’t leaving with strangers. He swallowed and shook off his stare. “Talk to us. Don’t just talk about us.”

Phasma licked her lips and then nodded, after glancing between his parents. “It’s…it’s like this, Mr. and Mrs. Solo. Like we told you before your flight, there is still so much to go through. They are still decompressing and we have to get full statements once they’re ready. And that might take a while. We are working with the FBI. They’ve been looking for this guy for a long, long time.”

His mother took a deep breath, which grated on his nerves, and then nodded. “We won’t hide anything from him. He’s our son. And we just want him to come home. That’s all we’ve wanted for so long.”

He sucked in air through his teeth and nuzzled Rey’s neck. He wasn’t going home with them. He was going to find a way out, get a job, a place to live, and they’d be fine. He would be a better parent than they ever were to him. He wasn’t going to forget important things. He wasn’t going to let Rey get taken in an open parking lot and forget about her.

Phasma looked at Kylo, meeting his eyes with a glance that he didn’t expect. She actually looked at him like she wanted him to hear what she was going to say. He pushed the feeling down, but knew that he wouldn’t forget it.

“We need you to talk to us, Ben. And we want it to be on your terms, but you need to give us something. Your parents have travelled a long way to be here for you. Believe us when we say that they’ve missed you and never stopped looking for you.” Phasma’s voice was firm, but not threatening. 

His lip trembled and he bit down hard to keep from responding. He had to think. “I want a phone.”

“Can he have a phone? He can have mine.” His father spoke again and rage swept across his eyes as the old man dug his hand into his pocket.

“I want my own phone. I haven’t had anything that has just been mine for seven fucking years. I…I will talk. If I get a phone.” He dropped his head again and breathed in heavily against Rey’s shoulder. She was murmuring lightly to him and he cursed himself for speaking so harshly. He pressed a gentle kiss on the back of her neck and looked up again. “Rey needs the washroom. We can talk later.”

He placed his charge on the floor and then stood himself, noticing how he came up to his father’s shoulders. Forcing his eyes down, he gathered Rey up again and started to cross the floor. His head forward and his strides determined, he fought to keep his dizziness from knocking him to the floor. His mother’s perfume, his father’s cologne…the colour of their eyes. All of it pressed on his senses. 

Cutting through the small group, no one stopped him.

Once they were in the private washroom of their room, he could finally exhale. Rey gently pushed away and out of his arms when he slid to the floor. Taking long, slow breaths, he found a water stain to study. Colour finally tinted the walls again, bleeding through the black and white tones that had been his vision since he brushed past his family.

“Kylo,” Rey demanded. “You lied.”

“I had to lie,” he answered, pulling his knees up to his chest and resting his head on them. “I’m sorry I made the lie about you.”

“Who’re they? Those people?” Rey lowered her high-pitched voice into a whisper, kneeling next to him. She put her hand on his bare foot. He didn’t want to wear those awful slippers again. 

He didn’t want to show weakness around her, but she was the only one who saw it. It wasn’t fair. Yet, a part of him wanted her to know that it was okay to feel bad, angry, and sad. Life shouldn’t be fake happy. Rey had to be normal; she couldn’t be like him.

“They’re my mom and dad.” He looked at her and his vision started to blur. Tears stung his eyes and he dug his fingers into the corners of his eyes to try to hold them back. 

She stared at him, her mouth sagging open. “Why?”

He felt heat rise to his cheeks. “To…take us home.”

“Are my mom and dad…where are them?”

“They. It’s they, not them, angel.” He finally let one of his hands drop to take hers. Their hands folded together and, for once, they didn’t have ragged and torn fingernails that were caked with dirt. They were clean and their hands were healing. “You’re my angel, right Rey?”

She grinned broadly, awkwardly leaning forward to wipe at his eye. “I came to Earth to save you. Then you saved me.”

“Yeah,” he managed to say with a light smile. “We don’t know where your parents are. But the police will find them.”

“Can I stay with you until then?” Her eyes suddenly twitched in panic. “With your…mom and dad?”

He nodded, his own worry settling in his temples again. “Yes. And if they won’t let us, I’ll save you again.”

Rey swallowed and nodded, her small head bobbing up and down. “Kylo…can I go play again?”

Blinking, he sat back, resting his head against the tiled wall. It was slightly warm from their shower that morning. He remembered the piercing look from the nurse as he took Rey to clean and dress her without her help. The same questioning eyes followed him when he helped her to the toilet later. Then he made the scene at breakfast. 

Maybe it was better that Rey learnt that she could be away from him.

She’d just be a few metres away, he told himself. They weren’t going to take her away.

And if he did, he’d hurt them. Just like he hurt Snoke.

He finally looked up at her with a gentle smile. She grinned back, so it must have looked real. 

“Go. We can go wherever we want now.”

She giggled and threw her arms around him, sloppily kissing his cheek before reaching for the heavy hospital door. He had to push himself to his feet to help her; her casted arm still made her weak. He'd have to wait until that was healed, at least. She gave him one last grin and skipped out into the hall. 

He watched her go and sank back down to his knees. Weakly, he crawled back into the washroom and locked the door. 

A sob rose up from his chest, exiting his mouth like a trapped demon. He sounded like a little boy, like the tortured cries from the older children as Snoke tortured and violated and then murdered them. He was crying their tears. He scratched at his cheeks, forcing on pain so he’d have a real reason to weep. The ache stretched on, burning his throat as he gasped for air. Forcing his hand into a fist, he punched the floor. The first time, he felt nothing. The second and third time, a slight tingle spread up to his wrist. Finally, the fourth and fifth time brought blood and the true, releasing sensation of pain. 

Sitting up, he looked at his torn and reddened knuckles.

Snoke’s gapping mouth flashed across his eyes and he looked away, catching the bottom of the small mirror at child height. 

He slowly stood, looking into the taller mirror.

Scraggly, raven-coloured hair. An awkward face and jaw. Ivory skin, now patched with red. His ears peaked out from his too-large head, mocking him from between his curls.

He could only meet his eyes for a second before looking away.

Maybe it was better that they find Rey’s parents. 

She had to look at him all the time. She needed someone better.

Slamming his hand against the faucet, he forced his injured hand under the water. Hissing at the warmth, his heart finally calmed. He wrapped a towel around his hand and shook off his doubt from a moment ago. Rey was his. She wasn’t going anywhere. She was his.

Unlocking the door, he decided he would sleep for a while until Rey got bored and returned to him.

A small white box was resting on his bed.

The note on top said ‘Love, mom and dad.’

He tossed the note in the trash and slid open the box. A gold-toned phone fell into his hand. It looked more like one of the few hand-held video game devices that he had as a kid. It was light, but the screen was massive. Fumbling to turn it on, it finally sprung to life. The white screen and black logo grounded him. It was his. He had another thing that was his.  
Reaching into his memory, he pressed the key that brought up the dial pad. He knew only three phone numbers by heart: his grandmother’s, his father’s office, and his best friend.

He went with the last one.

Kylo had only bothered to memorize the area code because of an awful vacation that they had taken the summer before he was taken. They went to Hawaii and he hated the sun. His father taught him about long-distance charges when they got the hotel bill. He didn’t care then and he didn’t care now.

When the number started to ring, his voice crept down into his throat and tried to flee into his stomach.

A familiar female voice answered. “Hello?”

He couldn’t speak. He couldn’t make a sound. But he wasn’t about to fail at this so he forced out something.

“Hey.”

“Hi, who’s this?”

“Is Armie there?” The words weren’t bunched together, but felt as much. His teeth clenched down as he waited for her answer.

“Armitage? He’s at school. Who is this?” She sounded annoyed. He spent so much time at the Hux family’s home that he thought that she would recognize his voice. He guessed that since he didn’t look like himself, he didn’t sound like it either. 

“It’s…” he paused, sucking on the back of his teeth. “Ben.”

He heard a low gasp. “Ben Solo?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh my God, Ben, we prayed for you. We prayed for you for so long. Are your parents there? Did you call them? Where are you? I haven't seen anything on the news...” She started weeping and he needed to roll his eyes. Why did she care? Prayer did nothing. She should have been out looking for him, not wasting time with an imaginary god for idiots.

“They’re here. Can…can I call Armitage later?”

Every word sounded dumb on his lips. The words only echoed in his ears. It was like she wasn’t real, just another daydream that he had when he was recovering from being beaten and chained in a room without sunlight. He once again questioned if this was a dream; if it weren’t for the weight of the phone in his hand and the scattered loose threads of the bedspread beneath him, this place could have been another fantasy. He ran his hand more rapidly against the bed, rubbing small circles until his palm felt slightly numbed.

“Ben, call him. You can call him at school. I’ll give you his number. I think…oh my God, Ben, you’re alive. Oh my God, he’s going to be so happy. I will…I’ll call the school so he can leave class. Here’s his number, are you ready?” Her voice was sloppy, drooping over every word. So at least he wasn’t the only one who couldn’t speak.

“Sure.”

She rattled off the number. He locked it into his head. She emphasized the area code again causing him to grunt likely.

“Ben, where are you?”

He silently looked at the phone.

He hadn’t wanted to ask.

“It came up on call display, sweetheart. You’re in California.”

The realization washed over him first as a gentle wave, then as a pulsing wind that pushed him further into his reality. California was across the country from Connecticut. How had he gotten there? Is that why no one could find him?

“I know,” he lied. “Can I have the number again?”

She gave it again. 

He hung up without saying goodbye and quickly put the number up on the screen. He looked at it until the numbers started to blur.

He waited ten minutes.

The phone screen went black and he panicked, quickly hitting the middle button again. It sprung to life and he stared again at what he wanted to do.

He just needed to know that he was missed by someone who he trusted.

He could trust Armitage. They had a sleepover the weekend before he left his life and talked about their plans for the summer. They were going to the same baseball camp for the first time. He needed to apologize for not keeping that promise.

He finally hit dial after another five minutes.

The phone rang once and an out-of-breath voice that he didn’t recognize answered. It took him a moment to realize it was his friend. He hadn’t spoken to him in seven years.

“It’s me,” he finally said, answering the hurried hello that he strained to comprehend.

A long and confused sigh was his response. “Who? What?”

“It’s…Ben.”

Armitage, who still didn’t sound like he should but it had to be him and Kylo had just forgotten everything about the boy who he used to know, let out a choked cry. Kylo let the sound travel down his body until the hairs on his arms rose. Someone actually missed him. Someone loved him.

“Is it really you? I…I got to leave class. Mrs Holdo just said that I was getting a call and it was emergency and it was so weird and I didn’t know what was going on and now…holy shit, man, you…you are alive. I don’t even know…” his friend’s voice trailed off as he started to weep. When his voice broke, he heard the echoes of the boy that he remembered. Once again he swallowed his own tears and cleared his throat.

“It’s me. Yeah, I…I have so much to tell you.” He listened to his friend cry, but then an odd hardness washed over him. “I need to go now. My parents are…here. I will call you later.”

“Yeah, sure. Please. I need to go to class, I guess.” Armitage chuckled through his tears. Kylo could almost picture the spray of built-up saliva from his mouth. “I can’t wait for you to come home. I missed you so much.”

He heard the words, but swallowed his instant response of _I miss you too_. Hux couldn’t know about how hard he cried about his friend. He couldn’t know how many times he hoped that he would be kidnapped too. It was only when Rey came that the sensation of permanently piling feelings into the empty hole of his absence was finally quelled. 

“I will be home soon.”

Then he hung up.

The phone buzzed oddly in his hand a minute later.

_Good to hear from you, bro. Everyone here is freaking out._

Kylo didn’t know why the sentence seemed to echo into a void as he stared at it.

He was still looking at the now blank screen when Rey returned, with his parents in tow.

If yesterday was the longest day, then today was already competing to surpass it. 

 


	3. Chapter 3

 

 

Kylo found a piece of escape in the thing he had been denied most: solitude and sunlight. They let them outside, into a seemingly hidden and private garden behind one of the back entrances to the hospital. It had been a fight to get there. He had grit his teeth as his parents protested and the nurses fussed over Rey; she needed to wear a facemask and she couldn’t go near the fountain because of her arm. They let her breathe in the sick air of the hospital and had no idea about the mould, dirt, and grime of their former prison. But, suddenly, the outside air was too dangerous. He finally agreed if it meant they could go outside and be alone. They could watch from the door, but they had to be alone.

He bargained for it, telling them he wouldn’t eat or answer anymore questions if they didn’t give them some space.

Sitting beside the small bubbling fountain, he let out a long sigh. It drained from his body into the warm air, mixing with the scent of blooming flowers and drifting blades of grass. It was early in the afternoon and the sun split through the shadows into the small courtyard. There were traces of cigarette butts by the entrance and he felt his mind slipping into the annoyance of how wasteful people were. Just after they had sat down, one nurse, who he didn’t recognize, slipped out and slammed the door open, making them both jump. He lit a cigarette and Kylo narrowed his eyes. He didn’t let the man out of his sight until he went back inside. That’s when Kylo could relax.

He wanted things to be normal and couldn’t figure out how to put the pieces back together. All of the edges had been worn off.

Rey looked up from her investigation of the water fountain. He heard her head move with the swish of the paper, breaking through the other sounds and the lingering turmoil of the earlier morning and awkward lunch.

Detective Phasma had been whispering to other police officers when he sat too close to Rey again, to help her eat. His mother and father didn’t seem to notice or care; they instead asked what Rey’s favourite colour was.

He was almost satisfied when Rey had said black and both of their faces cringed in unison.

“So much water.”

Her voice now was soothing, combining with the gentle rhythm of the lapping water. It didn’t echo like it did inside the sterile halls of the hospital. He had yearned for so long just to be able to hear something outside of scratched and scarred walls. There was stillness in nature that didn’t exist in confinement.

Rey didn’t seem to have an opinion, other than it was wonderful to be free.

Every second of freedom for her had been adventure that he was taking her on, keeping her safe. It had meant food and hugs, the power to have conversations without needing to blink or whisper, and new inventions and sights. She looked at everything with wide eyes, amazed in the fantasy world she now had access to; however, she still knew that when Kylo reached for her, it meant danger. He couldn’t let her think that everyone in the world was out to help her.

That’s what got him in trouble. That’s what broke him.

The delicate chirping of birds brought him back to the sunshine and he looked down at Rey.

He could see her smirk from behind her mask as her chinks wrinkled.

She splashed lightly at the water, watching it shimmer. “I like being clean.”

“Yeah, it’s nice,” he said, managing a small smile. “I’m…sorry for being angry before.”

He’d shouted at the doctors, the nurses, the detectives, and his parents. He used words that he didn’t want her to learn, but just had to. He had killed to be uncontrolled and at every turn he was being watched and prodded. If he didn’t lash out, his insides would turn to stone.

And if they took Rey from him, the last part of him would crumble and become dust.

She tilted her head. She looked so covered, her arm in a cast and her face obscured by the green and flimsy mask. The pyjamas still looked oversized and swallowed up her undersized body. Even in his darkness, he found happiness in the fact that she ate so much. Discovering cookies was a joy for her. He didn’t look at the plate in the same way when it was offered to them, but he ate one after she gave him a long look. Those eyes were the same ones that he had seen when he refused to tell her what had happened in the basement, after he had trudged upstairs on legs that could hardly function. In those darkest hours, his eyes were dry but his lips were quivering. Still, he’d still curl up to her in their little corner and she’d pick the blood out of his hair and hum lightly until they heard the heavy footfalls that meant silence until the storm had passed. Three sets of feet would go down into the basement; it was always only two that came up.

Until the last time when only one set did and those had been his.

As the fountain bubbled, he could still hear those footsteps and sucked in a quick breath as the memory shuddered through his body.

“You’re not angry. That’s normal,” Rey finally said.

The words cut through his tattered feelings so deep that he had to look away. He pretended to glare at the grove of trees at the edge of the yard. There was a parking lot on the other side, just peaking through the heavy brush. He’d already seen the photographers and strangers lurking there earlier. Upstairs, his father had looked out the window and glared, muttering to himself before calling over his mother. She’d simply just shut the curtains. Then, she wouldn’t answer his question about what was happening and he’d locked himself in the washroom with Rey until she apologized and said that it was the media. She mentioned that the police wanted to have a press conference and he turned his anger towards Phasma. The other woman had the decency to say that it might not be a good idea.

He’d left his phone in the room. Armitage had sent him messages, telling him about how there were pictures of him in the news. People were _pretending_ to know what had happened to him and the police were spreading stories. When his friend asked about the little girl, he turned the phone off and hid it in a drawer.

He didn’t know what to say to him.

And, now, he didn’t know what to say to Rey.

She knew the difference between good and bad, he had made sure of that. What was happening to them was _bad_. Protecting one another was _good_. He couldn’t do much more than that.

But was anger what she thought was normal for him? He hugged her and told her that he loved her. He was gentle and as kind as he could manage. Blinking back tears, he let the thought tumble around his head as he turned back to the soft circles of water, swirling in the fountain. Rey dipped her hand in and giggled and he smiled at her, dropping his fingers into the cool pool. He had to smile more, if only around her.

But the thought of smiling still made him ache. Crying did the same; they were both showing weakness when they wept. The only thing that he wanted to feel was anger and hurt, he wanted to let it burn through him until it sparked and travelled to that damned compound and let it torch the ruins of his childhood.

They both jolted as the outer door opened, hard metal cracking through the air. Instead of a smoker, it was a man in a dark grey suit and bright green tie. His shoulders were broad, but he was older than the nurses. He locked eyes on Kylo and a satisfied look crossed his bearded face. He was tall, taller than his father. Silver streaked through his beard and hair. His suit looked slightly wrinkled – it wasn’t like the crisp suits that Han wore in the morning on the way to work or the stylish outfits that his mother wore at dinner parties. It looked more like the late-evening state of their clothes, showing the wear of talking to too many people and doing too much of anything that would keep them out of the house and away from their awful son.

Standing from the cool fountain bricks, Kylo eyed the man. Rey sat still, but edged closer to him.

“Hello,” the man said, taking the three steps down to the ground in sturdy, quick motions. “I’ve been looking for you.”

“We can’t leave. It isn’t hard,” Kylo replied, raising his chin. He felt Rey move to stand beside him, forgetting the wonders of the water for a moment to hop down onto the ground. His feet were bare and hers were in a pair of shoes that his mother had bought her. It enraged him that she had bought her pink shoes when Rey had clearly said that her favourite colour was black.

“That’s not what I meant.” The man was closer now, feet crunching against the gravel. But he looked at them in a different way than the other adults. He stood a few metres away, stopped, and then took a slow step back. “May I speak with you? It’s been a long day.”

“Are you another cop?” Kylo asked, tiredly. He had stopped caring about being polite, but didn’t snap. Rey was there. He had to remember that. “We’ve talked. You should know everything now. You’re telling it to everybody else.”

The man looked quickly at his black shoes, then back up to them. He was carrying a black satchel, held loosely in his large hand. His eyes were kind, but Kylo could also see the creases and the darkness under them. But the space that he left between them made Kylo dare to sit down on the fountain’s edge again. The man gave him a small nod and approached them both. He sat down, still at a comfortable distance. Rey looked at the man, her forehead creasing, before Kylo gently pulled her closer, helping her up onto the ledge again.

The sound on the streaming water settled over them as Kylo eyed the stranger.

“I should introduce myself. I’m Supervisory Special Agent Jinn, from the FBI. We’re like the police for the police, helping them with very serious crimes,” the man explained, mainly looking at Rey. He paused and his eyes drifted up to Kylo and, if he didn’t know better, he would have sworn he saw the man’s eyes shimmer. “I’ve been looking for you for as long as you’ve been gone, Kylo. I want to apologize for never getting to you sooner.”

The man’s voice was deep and Kylo thought he heard sincerity in the words. His blue eyes flicked from Kylo to Rey and he took a deep and tired breath. “And I’m sorry to you too, Rey. I never knew that I was looking for you too.”

Kylo nudged Rey. She first looked at him, then at the agent.

“Are you police too?” Her voice was curious rather than weak. He’d heard the doctors remarking that she was very advanced for coming out of the situation, but they were worried about the over stimulation she was getting. Too many things would happen and she couldn’t sort them out in her head. She needed to ask more questions, Kylo decided. She needed to figure out her own pace.

He knew her better than the doctors and she could do anything.

“Yes, yes I am. This is my case. It turns out, we were looking in the wrong place. And I’m very, very sorry for that.” Jinn briefly looked down at his hands, setting the satchel on the ground before placing both of his large hands on his legs. Kylo watched as the man wiped his palms against his trousers and frowned inwardly.

“Why?” Rey’s voice broke his concentration again and he was thankful for it.

Jinn bit his lip at Rey’s question. “Terrible, unimaginable things happened to you. And I can’t undo them. Time doesn’t work that way. But me feeling bad doesn’t fix anything, right?”

Rey scratched her head. She pulled at the mask, looking up at Kylo. He shrugged and she slipped off the paper; the agent didn’t react. They could have entire conversations in mere looks and that gave him release. Adults always talked, and there were too many questions. Rey was his harbour in this maelstrom. He watched her take in a deep and long breath, sucking in the fresh air. The smile that she gave him when she turned made him realize that his heart was still beating and he’d always have her. The painful memories of the stabs from the stones on the driveway leading away from Snoke were dwarfed by the beaming grin she gave him at the sensation of the sun and warmth on her face. They would fade, but her light would never dissipate, if he could help it.

Still, she turned back to Jinn with a question on her mind. “We hurt but you feel bad?”

Kylo would have called what he felt pride, but he tried to resist it. He couldn’t think that everything that Rey did was his doing. He’d done what he could and would have to keep working at it. The second they left with Han and Leia, he’d be looking for ways to get him and Rey away from them. They were useless parents, but he still needed them for a while. The best solution was to force himself to play along. He’d go home, he’d be with Armitage again. He’d ask him for money or how to get it. He must know. He was always the best at coming up with plans and organizing things.

He played out his intentions as the agent delicately spoke with Rey. He was telling her about how he’d been finding clues and following leads. The soothing sound of the man’s voice lulled him into his fantasy. He thought about how he’d _have_ to finish school first. He could do it. He’d be out of school by the time that Rey was eight. He’d have to give her a real childhood after that. She needed birthday parties with friends, and a yard to play in, and a dog…

His ears slowly tuned back in on what the agent was saying as his imagination threatened to fade into the sunlight. But still, his perfect life lingered in his mind as the words filtered into his mental images. _Who was with you at the house, Rey?_ He had pictured the apartment he’d get at first – it would be like Uncle Luke’s but without the hollow emptiness that his home gave off. They’d have to get that at first in order to save money. _When did he hurt you the most?_ There would be a small kitchen with a solid table for two in the corner. He’d help Rey with her homework – he wouldn’t make someone else do it. He’d make dinner after work from real things; it wouldn’t just come from something in the freezer on weeknights and save the fancier things for guests at party that only showed off the surface of how things should look. They would make it on their own. _When was Kylo hurt the most?_ He wouldn’t cry at night and he’d never be weak in front of her. He wouldn’t let her hurt. She would be allowed to cry. That’s what girls were allowed to do. Boys shouldn’t be filled with tears that they didn’t know what to do with.

But even in his imagination, what Jinn was saying to Rey continued to break through the fog of his mind. The fountain bubbled and the words faded back into reality, the now: _The last boy, what was his name?_

He knew about the others. He caught the end of what Rey was saying, how she didn’t know, and shook his head.

“Angel, you remember him. He had dark hair and gave you the stone,” he spoke as the sunlight warmed his shoulders. He still pictured himself in his imaginary kitchen, as an adult and a whole person.

When he finally turned his full attention back to the two sets of eyes looking at him, he realized that he said the wrong thing.

He’d been weak again, lost in fantasy. He’d spoke instead of blinking.

Snoke was right about him.

He’d never escape that.

But Jinn didn’t move for his bag. Instead, he leaned back and stretched his arms out and seemed to be enjoying the sunshine.

“We are going to have a hard conversation, but let’s not rush it. I think that you two have earned some time in the sun.”

Kylo looked at the man with guarded amazement, and just nodded.

A rustle from the bushes made all three turn. Kylo heard the snap of a camera and was on his feet, ready to charge barefoot across the grass. Jinn stood too and frowned in the direction of the interlopers rather than Kylo’s twisted fists.

“I guess there’s no escape anywhere,” the other man mumbled.

Rey tugged at Kylo’s hand and he let his fists release. “They never cared. Why now.”

He heard Jinn chuckle lowly. “I think that you’re going to be amazed by how much this country has cared about you. If you’re comfortable, we can talk here. They want me to bring you to the office, but I don’t really like following the rules. We would like to show you some things that might help you. And the others.”

Kylo slowly turned to look up at the agent, his suspicions crawling up his spine to escape from his mouth: “We don’t know who you are.”

“Right,” Jinn said and the quickly produced a badge and ID. Kylo pretended to know what all of the information meant. He looked at it like he’d seen on television, and then handed it back with a quick shake of his head. “Great. Let’s sit down and talk a little. If you want to.”

Kylo slowly sat down and took a deep breath. Rey climbed up onto his lap and he hugged her waist. This man knew the other half of the story, which was one he didn’t want to hear from his parents. They still looked at him with glossy eyes so what they would say would be coloured by their own mistakes. But the only way to get his answers was to be willingly interrogated again. He felt his pulse start to quicken. He had been able to keep things from the other police, but the way that this man looked at them told him that he wouldn’t be as easily fooled.

He was in trouble.

It was as if Jinn could hear his thoughts and he shook his head. “I just want to hear your story, Kylo. You don’t have to worry.”

But he did. He dropped his forehead against Rey’s small shoulder and shrugged. “What if I don’t want to tell you anything?”

He watched as the agent reached into his bag to pull out a recorder. It was small and silver and reminded him of the phone he’d hid in his hospital room. He placed it on the edge of the fountain and gently pressed a button. The device beeped to life and Kylo sucked in a breath.

“Then I can answer your questions instead,” he said, lightly. “But to be fair, for every question you ask, I get to ask one of my own.”

“Rey gets to ask questions too. So, two questions.” Kylo shoved his selfishness aside and hugged her a little as he spoke. “Then you can ask something, I guess.”

“Fair is fair.”

He nudged Rey a little and she squeezed his hand in agreement.

“Have you found Rey’s parents?” Kylo asked, bluntly.

Jinn’s face was unreadable until he sighed. “We are still looking. Remember when they took the swab of your mouth, Rey? We’re looking for something called DNA; that will help us find your parents. It’s like a plan for how you were made. It will match your mom and dad. It will take a while to search everywhere on our computers. But this is where answering one of my questions will help us all. Kylo, which house did he bring her to? This one, or the one in Colorado?”

Kylo swallowed, his mouth suddenly dry. “We were in Colorado before?”

Nodding, Jinn reached for his satchel again. “I’m going to show you some things now, just to prove to you that I’m not a liar. I know that you hate liars.”

Kylo didn’t react. He just waited for Jinn to show him the pictures.

He just wanted to know what he remembered was real. It all couldn’t have been the blur that he wanted to think that it was.

He showed him what looked like a nice house, in a nice neighbourhood. Jinn then handed him the next picture: the basement. Swallowing the urge to throw up, Kylo quickly nodded.

“She wasn’t there. She was only here, at the last place. We were only in that house for a little while.” He dropped his head. “He’d…he could…I mean…only six kids died there. He only took me to this place.”

Nodding, Jinn put the pictures away, only to produce another one.

“This,” Jinn paused to hand him the picture. “Was where you were in Connecticut.”

Kylo kept his hand straight, denying his body the relief of shaking, as he took the sheet. It was just the outside of a rundown house. It looked small and falling apart. But it had been so big. The day he was brought there, he thought that the house had been huge. He stared at it and then shook his head.

“Why didn’t you ever find me then?” He asked, willing his voice to be firm. Yet, the hurt was starting to creep up his throat. He held Rey closer to keep himself in the moment.

Jinn briefly closed his eyes and then leaned forward to rest his elbows on his thighs. “We missed you by two weeks.”

His vision tilted and his body went rigid.

 _Two weeks_.

Instantly, Rey turned in his arms to hug him. Rage blossomed in his chest and she did what she always had. She pulled her small arms around him and nuzzled his neck.

But he couldn’t take his eyes off of the agent.

His life had been stolen from him because they’d been too late.

He let the picture drop into the dirt and wrapped his arms around Rey. He stood from the fountain and marched towards the door to the hospital, but stopped short. He dropped to his knees and lightly started whispering to her that he was okay, he wasn’t angry at her, he was going to be okay. Her arms gradually loosened and she sat back onto the ground.

He met her eyes and blinked the next part to her. _Need to talk to him. Don’t be afraid._

 _Not afraid._ She answered. _Can I play?_

_Yes. But stay near me._

He stood, leaving her to follow after him. Pausing, he frowned. He must have taught her that word. She needed to know how to play. Shaking his head, he bit his lip and sat down with hard eyes on the agent as Rey dawdled towards the other side of the fountain. Her head was towards the water, but he knew her eyes were still on him.

“Why couldn’t you find us?” He asked. “There were six kids there. Didn’t anyone hear anything?”

Jinn licked his lips. “It was very…remote. But I want you to know that we never stopped looking.”

“You missed us in Connecticut and Colorado. You weren’t looking hard enough.” Kylo rubbed his eyes and sat back. “You can ask a question now.”

“Who else was there, in Connecticut? The first house.”

He was at least asking the right questions. Kylo sighed, bringing his legs up to tuck under his chin.

“I don’t know their real names. We all got new names. We could never say our real names,” he mumbled. “But when he took me, there was an older boy that helped him. Cassian. He…he died.”

Jinn nodded and pulled out another picture. “I think this is who you’re talking about. His real name was Erik Carter. He disappeared when he was ten and we think that he was about fifteen when he died. We found him with the others there. We could identify three of the bodies, but we haven’t been able to figure out who the other four are. We need you to help us with that, give us clues about when they were there.”

Kylo just stared at the picture of the boy he had briefly known as Cassian. He was younger in the picture, but it was him. The same eyes that he remembered fading into death were locked into an eternal gaze of the photograph. He had been the one to trick him out of his father’s car. He had been the one to convince him that his father didn’t care about him and he needed to come with him to play a game. Kylo remembered being angry that Han was taking so long. They had been waiting in the empty parking lot of the baseball diamond for forever; everyone else was gone and Kylo had felt embarrassed that his father always needed to talk to someone, somewhere all the time.

He shook out of the memory of being helped into the back of Snoke’s van. But the moist, dismal smell of the interior followed him. One of the corners of the hospital’s stairwell had shaken the scent loose from his mind and now it was trailing him everywhere.

“Four?” He choked out, shifting his weight. “So we were…eight?”

“Yes, four.”

Kylo dropped his head. “I only knew five other kids when I was there. He…he said that there couldn’t be more than six.”

He trailed off, letting his eyes blur. He had made seven, so there was someone else there already dead before Snoke had taken him. At first, he wasn’t afraid of Snoke. He was tired and wanted to go back to his room to play Nintendo at home. That was the first time he saw Snoke’s rage and Kylo saw the terror in the eyes of the other six children in the empty living room. The windows were boarded up and it was hard to breathe. Kylo complained about that and Snoke had slowly stood from the single chair in the corner. Wordlessly, his hand went out to Cassian. He was the tallest and stood infront of the others. Kylo didn’t know who they were and they were dirty and smelled weird. He didn’t want to be there anymore and had yelled at him for being a weirdo.

Cassian’s eyes were locked on his; Kylo was ignoring the warning to shut up.

Snoke took a knife from his belt.

He made Kylo come closer, saying that he couldn’t hear him.

Cassian stood between them, suddenly snapping that Kylo would behave. He was new. He’d work with him to be better.

Something warm splashed on his face a second later. Cassian dropped to the ground, clutching at his throat. Kylo remembered wondering why there was red syrup on the floor, all of it coming from Cassian’s neck. He was looking down, hearing him gurgle and saw tears streaming down his face.

He was hurting; the strange man had hurt him.

It was blood. There was blood seeping onto the floor. Snoke’s arm then shot out, grabbing Kylo’s arm. He forced the knife into his hand and told him to end the other boy’s suffering.

Kylo didn’t know what that meant.

He had to learn quickly after that; listening to Snoke was the only way.

He had to wear the other boy’s blood for weeks until it finally flaked away.

The agent cleared his throat and his eyes fluttered at the sound.

“Listen, Kylo, this isn’t a normal thing that you went though. I’m not speaking as a police officer right now, but as a human being. You didn’t do anything wrong by surviving, okay? We know that. Everyone here is on your side. The fact that you’re alive made us realize that there isn’t always emptiness at the end of a hunt for darkness. We have you and Rey. We can’t undo the cruelty to the others, but we can help find where they came from.”

“I don’t think I know,” Kylo said through gritted teeth. “I’m just…bad at this.”

“No, you’re not,” Jinn said. “And I’ll help you, I promise.”

“Why?” He asked, feeling his annoyance at himself start to grow. “It’s like everyone wants me to be normal and I haven’t been _normal_ in seven years. I want Rey to be normal and I’m trying my best, but I know it’s not good enough. I don’t think you can help me because I couldn’t help anyone else out, just Rey. I don’t need your help, but she does…and they do too.”

Jinn’s face was neutral, but Kylo could see a hidden smile in the way that his eyes wrinkled. “I told you that you weren’t bad at this. That’s why I’m on your side. Helping the others find their way home will help so many families. I know why you’re angry at your parents right now, and you are allowed to feel that way, no matter what the others say. But other parents will never know what happened to their children. They don’t get to be mad at their parents again. You can be mad, happy, and everything else for them. But you can also help me, Kylo, and I can do what I can to help you in return.”

After glancing over at Rey, who was sitting in the grass and carefully plucking blades one by one to study them, he looked back at the agent. “Everyone else keeps calling me Ben. Why are you actually listening to me about what I want?”

Shrugging, Jinn swept his eyes over to Rey. He then reached down to pause the recorder and Kylo felt a jolt of panic. “I’m going to tell you something that I think that you both should hear.”

Still processing the gesture, Kylo acted before he could over think it. He just had to tap the stone of the fountain lightly to bring Rey to her feet and over to him. She frowned as she looked between the two men. Jinn shifted closer and leaned towards them. It was clear to Kylo that a secret was coming.

He probably didn’t want to hear it.

“I read about what happened at the house here and what you did, Kylo. It was unbelievably brave and that shows you’re a stronger person than you’re thinking right now. But what happened is making the others nervous. What I want is that you both stay together — healing only comes from building the bond that you have and letting it grow healthier. I can do what I can to make that happen, that you all go home as a family. But you have to at least pretend, for now, that you’re feeling better. I know you’re not, they know you’re not, but they need to see something called progress. Sometimes what can start as pretending will feel more real over time. Do you understand?” Jinn’s voice was serious, but steady.

A rigidness spread through his arms; the agent didn’t know how good he was at pretending.

Jinn didn’t seem to notice how his posture changed and clicked the recorder back to life. “I think that it’s something we can work on, all of us, to help you learn to be Ben again.”

“Yeah,” Kylo forced out the word, the agent’s earlier words settling into his chest. “I can do that.”

“Good. I think that’s enough for now. Let’s go inside and speak with the others for a while,” he said, before clicking off the recorder and stowing it in his bag.

Kylo didn’t follow for a few moments, returning his eyes to the water. His arm twitched and he had to force himself from slamming his fist against the surface, wanting to disturb the delicate waves with his own power.

His shoulders were low as he walked beside Rey to follow the agent inside. His mind was still drifting between fantasy and memory as he left nature to return to his new prison. 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, apologies for the lack of updates on everything. April went by in the blink of an eye and I'm still buried in work. Hugs and thanks for all of the comments and kudos on this and everything else! May will be another crazy month of teaching, research, a conference...I'm exhausted in advance but miss writing so it will be hard to keep away from things that bring me joy. :)


	4. Chapter 4

 

They were building a scooter. A new therapist had shown up that morning with the plans and the large box and said that they were going to do it together.

She said to call her Maz.

Kylo didn’t understand the point of building something and reluctantly sat on the carpeted floor of the therapy room. Rey sat down next to him and looked at the stranger with a puzzled look on her face, but he could see her hidden excitement in constructing something new. She was wiggling her fingers, eager to take on the challenge. The woman was older with large, thick glasses. She wasn’t exactly smiling; her mouth was quirked into a friendly look. Kylo picked up the piece of paper and levelled a look at her.

“I don’t get it,” he said, tossing the paper back down. “We won’t be able to use it. We’re stuck here.”

“We’re going to work together,” she replied. “It’s part of healing and getting better — working in a group, talking about what happened, while doing something constructive. Maybe it will make you feel better, maybe it won’t. But it’s worth trying because I’ve seen it help other children like you work through something traumatic. You agree that what you went through wasn’t normal, right?”

“Normal? Of course it’s not normal,” he shot back. _I had to kill someone. I bashed his head in and then choked him until he died. But he was a bad man and was going to hurt Rey,_ he thought to himself. He sat silent for a moment, flexing his hands until he noticed her watching. He stuck his hands in his lap and lifted his chin. “We were in a house of death. We never thought we’d get out. And now we’re stuck here. It’s not normal to be trapped everywhere.”

“See? It’s not normal to feel things like that,” Maz replied, opening the toolbox beside her. “Let’s get started. You can answer my questions if you think it will help you. Or, we can just build something fun.”

It didn’t look like fun, Kylo thought as he rolled his eyes. He was getting tired of the therapy room. They were either there or in the playroom, or their room. Even going to the cafeteria was becoming difficult; there would be reporters lurking there, so they ate in their room. But the therapy room had an odd smell; it was clean, but there was a dryness in the air that made him uneasy. Most of his thoughts that morning had been about the press conference he was going to be forced to do in the afternoon. He didn’t want to do it, but Agent Jinn had convinced him it would help him to get out and go home: that’s all he wanted. He needed to leave California behind him and finally agreed. He'd known the agent less than a day and it was a release to put his trust in someone who could affect things. His parents were just moping around, looking at him constantly and expecting him to change.

Still, the therapist was staring at him. He slowly reached for two pieces of long, thin pipe and looked down at the paper. The steps were easy enough to follow; he wasn’t stupid. He still didn’t understand why they needed to build the thing, but pushed down his annoyance to let it turn into numbness.

“Do you have any questions, Rey?” Maz turned her attention to Rey as he fiddled with the first two parts. “How are you feeling today?”

He handed Rey the two pieces of pipe he was screwing together. She turned her focus to him as he showed her what he was doing. She quickly followed his instructions, carefully holding one of the pieces with her broken arm and continuing to turn the other piece. He looked forward to getting her real things to build and fix. Thoughts about the future, and the lingering words from the FBI agent, kept him from snapping at the annoying routine they were falling into.

They were healthy. The doctors had given them both painkillers at the start. Rey needed more vitamins, but their bodies were finally healing. They were talking about resetting his broken wrist and broken ankle. The lingering broken rib, which he didn't even feel anymore, would continue to heal by itself. They found tiny scars on his skin—thin as spider webbing in parts, thick as repeated slices from a blade on others—but reasoned that they would fade with time and care. His broken bones were bigger problems. He was starting to notice how stiff his wrist was in the docile environment. The day that it happened was years ago, but it still shone in his mind. Snoke had grabbed his hand and struck him with a hammer to hear him scream and to test a new idea he had come up with in his twisted mind. Without thinking, he started wringing his arm as Rey continued to tighten the two metal rods together.

“I feel…I don’t know,” Rey finally answered, finished her task. “What’s next?”

Maz nodded and sat back, shifting her hands to rest behind her. “Next is the base. Can you do it?”

“I can do anything with Kylo,” Rey answered, her face brightening. “He stopped Snoke. He’s going to teach me how to read.”

Maz smiled and sat up again, reaching for a medium-sized bag of metal, a mixture of pieces, nuts, and bolts. “How would you feel if you went to live somewhere without him?”

Rey’s face fell. “Are they going to do that?”

Rey’s head snapped to him and she blinked rapidly. _I don’t want to go anywhere without you_.

 _You’re not going to. Jinn promised_. He quickly answered, gently putting his arm on her shoulder. The touch calmed her and she exhaled, turning back to Maz.

“I’d be scared,” she carefully said. “He’s my family. I love him. You don’t leave love.”

“No, no you don’t,” Maz replied, nodding. She handed the bag to Kylo, who had set his eyes on her with a growing hatred. “What does it mean to love someone?”

The question made him drop his head for a second, then he looked to Rey. For once, she didn’t look to him for the answer.

“You kill for them. You save them. I got saved by Kylo and I saved him.” Rey was lifting her chin, mirroring his posture. “I want to kill Snoke. He hurted us.”

“Snoke’s gone. Would you hurt anyone that hurt Kylo?”

“Yes,” Rey said, looking back down at the pipes in her hand. “I want to hurt Snoke cause he made everyone dead.”

“Tell me about your other friends, Rey, the other children,” Maz asked with a calm tone that kept pushing Kylo towards the edge.

He put his energy into opening the bag and spilling its content on the floor. He pulled Rey onto his lap and she sorted the pieces into small piles. She needed to be focused on something else. They’d asked him about the others and he knew what she felt and thought, but also wanted to know how she’d explain it to someone else. He’d have to be prepared when he took her to school; teachers asked so many stupid questions and never stopped if they didn’t get the answer that they wanted. He remembered saying that his parents didn’t love him when they were late in picking him up. His teacher would frown and tell him that’s not what he meant. Why would he say it if he didn’t mean it?

“I liked Tallie. She was my friend.” Rey was still sorting as she talked. “I didn’t want her to be gone.”

Kylo cleared his throat, needing to release the growing itch under his skin. “The day it all happened was the worst day. I told Agent Jinn about this, but I guess you want to know too because you won't listen to him. I think that Snoke knew something was happening. Agent Jinn told me that they were getting closer to finding him, like they almost did before. I think the FBI are better than normal police — they were actually looking for us.

“We woke up that morning and Snoke was already in the basement. Something was wrong. He was never down there so early. He hated being awake during the day. We could eat during the day. We could sleep and talk. He gave us food so we wouldn’t die before he could kill us.” He was helping Rey build the base for the scooter as he spoke, letting his larger hands help her smaller ones fit the nuts and bolts together, following the plans. Maz was watching them and he had to ignore it. “But that morning, he was going nuts. I mean, he’d go nuts all the time, but this was fucking insane. He was going to have to move somewhere new again, I think. He didn’t want to because he really liked that place. It had a giant basement with these barrels.”

Maz was nodding. “Was Tallie put in a barrel?”

Rey looked up. “Kylo had to put her in one. He said she’s in heaven so she needs to be safe so she’d go there. Can I go to heaven so I can play with her?”

“I think you’ll be very, very old when you go to heaven, Rey. Older than I am. And you’ll get to have that life because Kylo got you out.” Maz’s tone was even and she wasn’t writing anything done. It made Kylo worried. There were too many unknowns when something unexpected happened.

He watched her eyes as they drifted from Rey and how she was assembling the parts, back to him. He felt her expectations start to press on him and he continued.

“I…Snoke grabbed Tallie first. She was almost my age, maybe? I don’t know. Her stomach started hurting and she made a mess with blood. It made Snoke really mad. She couldn’t go with him, he said. It was stupid that Tallie made a mess. She was sleeping with us, in our spot. I thought that he wouldn’t hurt her if she was with us.” He frowned at the memory. “He took her and made me come with him. I knew what he was going to do if he brought me.”

He paused, picking up a random nut and bolt. He slowly started twisting the hexagon onto the notched spike as he spoke. “I knew he wasn’t going to stop. He was packing up to leave and finished with us.”

“That must have been hard when you went upstairs to the others.” Maz’s voice almost sounded like she cared. Kylo just looked at his hands.

“Yeah.”

He didn’t want to speak more after that. He let Maz ask Rey questions and instead focused on the task of finishing the thing. If they were done, they could go. He handed Rey pieces and she worked with them as she answered the questions. They weren’t painful questions, yet they still wore down his energy. It was like he was too angry to be mad that someone was intruding on what they had lived through and shared; all of the thoughts were getting clogged at the same spot and couldn't spread to his mind. The memories were heavy, erupting into nightmares at night and conjured by scents. Talking about them just made them real and harder to forget.

He watched as Rey’s hands slowed on her progress at one question.

_Did Snoke ever touch your private area?_

Rey held the pieces firmly in her hand and lifted her head. At first, he wondered if she understood what the question meant; her next actions told him that she clearly comprehended what the therapist was asking. She let the metal pieces drop, got herself to her feet, and looked at Maz with rigid temerity: her hands balled into fists and she dropped her chin.

“ _No_.”

He finally saw Maz flinch at the tone from the small girl; Rey’s answer was firm and wasn’t open to be questioned.

But it was also a partial lie.

The tense tableau of Rey staring down at Maz was finally broken when he stood up too.

“We’re done. He never touched her like that. When can we go home?” He put his hand on Rey’s shoulder and she turned to hug his leg, rubbing her face against the soft fabric of his trousers.

“Soon.” Maz managed a small smile as she stood. “I think that you two did a great job. You’re a good team. And I think that you’re both really brave.”

“Lady,” Kylo huffed. “It’s not brave to just survive.”

The door opened behind them and he gave her one last glance over his shoulder as he turned to go. She was still looking down at the finished scooter that they had somehow managed to build while shedding bits of darkness into the arid room.

His mother was sitting on their bed when they finally got back. They must have been early because she looked up with tired and tear-filled eyes when the nurse let them inside. Seeing his mother with her guard down made him pause for a moment. She was so old. She wore clothes like his grandmother. Her blouses at home were always colourful; now, they were just white. They were plain. He never thought of his mother as someone like that before.

“Well?” Her face suddenly changed when she stood up, her mask returning. “Does it feel like progress?”

“It doesn’t feel like anything,” he said with a shrug. “We’re tired. If that means anything.”

He glanced around the rest of the empty room and raised an eyebrow.

Leia nodded. “Your father had to go home, but he’ll be back.”

His stomach soured at the thought of Han returning home for _business._ Leia shook her head as the feeling spread up to twist his face into a deep frown.

“He’s fixing up the room for Rey.”

Rey’s head shot from Leia to look at him. He looked down at her as the hairs on his arms rose.

“She can stay with us?” The question left his lips in a bare whisper.

Leia looked at him with a careful smile. “Sit down. Agent Jinn had to deal with something, but he wanted me to tell you what happened to Rey’s parents.”

With slow caution, they moved to the bed. He helped Rey up and then she was in his lap again. She was always warm and comforting, even when the world crumbled around them.

“This is just what he said, and you can ask him later if you don’t believe me. They narrowed down the time when Rey was taken. You said she was just a baby and they started there. You’ve done such a good job, Ben. You’re helping everyone.” His mother’s voice was gentle, but she emphasized the last part, much to his irritation.

“Are they…where are they?” Rey asked. She didn’t care about the rest of what Leia was saying. He could feel her heart fluttering at the mention of her family. Maz’s earlier words must have still been rattling around in her head.

“Sweetie, they’ve passed away. They were living a hard life, but they weren’t bad people.”

“Of course they were bad,” he snapped. “They let their child disappear and didn’t find her.”

He locked eyes with Leia and saw the flash of hurt in her eyes. He wanted to press harder on the wound, to rip up her heart more. Their lives had always been too full for him. He was always in the way. He needed them too much; what was wrong with that?

“But I think the main thing we have to think about is that Rey can stay with us,” Leia said, her voice not breaking. “We should know soon when we can all go home and be a family.”

He didn’t react outwardly, but inside a spark blossomed in his chest.

The world wasn’t just going to be police and hospitals forever.

But he didn’t say that he felt hope to his mother.

“Can you go away now?” His voice was flat and Leia closed her eyes before nodding.

“I’ll come get you for lunch. Have a good nap, sweethearts.” Leia looked at him with clear brown eyes, but he still knew that he’d found the right point to push on to get his way.

Finally alone, he stretched out and yawned. Rey sat still on the bed, fiddling with a loose thread on her pants. Her eyes weren’t really focused on anything and it made the earlier conversation even more damaging.

“Nobody has to know what really happened,” he said, stroking her back in gentle circles. His hand looked enormous against her slender form. “You don’t need to talk to everyone about everything. Talk to me about it.”

She sniffled and nodded, turning to snuggle up beside him. Her head rested on his chest and he heard her take a shaky breath.

“Am I bad too, Kylo?”

“What?”

“I never looked for my family.”

Shutting his eyes, his own words blasted him in the chest.

“You didn’t have to look for them. I’m your family and you found me instead.”

He felt her nod and closed his eyes, worried that tears would fall if he didn’t.

“If you were gone, I’d look for you.” Rey’s voice was small, heavy with sleep.

“I’d look for you forever,” was what he managed to answer, following her into unconsciousness. "I won't ever leave you."

But the words followed him into sleep and his dreams.

They were older, but still the same. Rey’s eyes set in an adult face, large and brown and filled with rage. She was yelling at Uncle Luke — but how could she know him? They were in his house, but the walls were blurred and shifting, phasing in and out of his vision. It was a blur of his childhood home and his childhood prison, walls shifting from the soft lilac that he’d helped pick out to the rotten, wooden pillars of Snoke’s torture chamber. He focused on Luke and couldn’t hear what he was saying, but felt clear panic at the hazy words.

He was taking Rey away.

He was dangerous and always had been.

When a strong hand gripped his shoulder, he shook awake. His head hurt as his eyes shot open to see Agent Jinn looking down at him. He threw his arms around the other man’s neck, hugging him as the dream echoed in his head. He heard himself whimper and gripped Jinn’s shirt, burrowing his head against his strong form.

“It’s okay, Kylo. It was just a dream.” The soft, soothing words broke the rhythm of his gasping sobs. 

Rey stirred at the movement and sat up. He could feel her move to hug his side as he took deep breaths, taking in the agent's cologne.

He felt frozen, surrounded by caring arms, not willing to give up the sensation for the chaotic gloom that was everything else.

“I just want to go home,” he mumbled.

Jinn lightly pulled back and looked at them both with quiet sympathy.

“You’re going to get through this, I promise,” he paused to look from Kylo to Rey. “Both of you.”

“But why is it so hard and unfair? Why do I want to hurt everyone? Why am I always mad? Why doesn’t anything feel _good_?” He spat the words out, wiping at his eyes with his free arm. The other was around Rey, holding her tighter as his emotions spilled out.

“You’re not supposed to feel good right away. It doesn’t work that way. If there was a switch that would turn everything bad to good, I swear that I would flip it for you. But that’s like your dream, the one that just made you cry out in your sleep. It’s not reality. No one will ever know what you went through, but we’re trying. And I want to keep trying to make things feel good again.” His words were soothing and Kylo lifted his head towards him. “This is just the start. There’s a long, long story left for you both to write.”

Even as he let the words comfort him, he realized that the other man wouldn’t be there forever. The bitter thought helped ebb his tears as he shook his head. He gripped the bed sheet before releasing it.

At least someone understood.

Or at least pretended to.

He slowly looked from Jinn to his mother, who was lurking of the doorway with the same expression of pain as before. He felt his mouth twitch. He had hardly touched her and now he was throwing himself at an authority figure. After briefly meeting her eyes, he looked away.

“We’re going to be okay,” he leaned over to whisper to Rey. “He’s going to help us.”

Nodding, she hugged him lightly.

He couldn’t linger for much longer. Rey needed lunch and he had to prove to Agent Jinn that he could perform at the press conference.

The despair remained, but at least the future was a little less blurry. Rey was going to stay with him, and that’s what mattered. He would deal with his own emotions when he was home and not surrounded by people asking questions that he didn’t want to answer.

 

 


	5. Chapter 5

 

“Here, I got this for you.”

Kylo looked away from staring at his face in the mirror to the figure in the open washroom doorway. He was already tired and angry; the intrusion wasn’t exactly welcomed. But the familiar voice set his shoulders at ease.

Agent Jinn stood there, a sweatshirt in his outreached hand. “I didn’t think you’d want to wear pyjamas.”

Kylo licked his lips and ran his hand through his hair, pretending that he wasn’t trying to figure out if he wasn’t ugly or not. It took only a moment to turn so he hoped that the agent didn’t see the dampness at the corners of his eyes. To make up for it, he took the shirt and unfolded it, forcing his delight at the gift. It was what he actually felt, but wasn’t sure how he wanted to react normally. “It says FBI.”

Jinn winked, buying his charade. “It looks more official when you’re sitting beside me.”

Kylo gripped the shirt and nodded thanks. He had some idea about why he was given the shirt; Jinn wanted him to trust him and feel comfortable. The idea of just sitting in front of the media — which was all he had to do, he didn’t have to talk—made his stomach turn.

He stood there for another awkward moment before pulling the shirt over his light shirt. It was a little too big, so he looked back to Jinn with a shrug. The other man just gave him a light smirk and turned back to his mother and Rey. Kylo knew that they were there but kept his head down, afraid to see Rey’s eyes as he put on the shirt.

“We don’t know if it will help, but we’re going to show a picture of Rey. There might be someone that recognizes her or her parent’s names. We’re still looking to see if she has grandparents or other family,” he spoke with firmness and turned to glance at him. “We just want to make sure that this is can be a permanent arrangement.”

He didn’t want to know her real name — it was clear that he would know it soon, but to him, she would always be just Rey.

No one was saying anything so Kylo tilted his head. “I don’t want anyone to find her.”

A strange silence that he didn’t expect settled over the room. He finally looked at Rey and she looked at him with bright and happy eyes. When he turned his head in the other direction, he found a different reaction.

Jinn’s mouth firmed into a line. “Why don’t we ask Rey what she wants?”

He could only blink in response, nodding meekly. He needed Agent Jinn to like him and protect him at the same time. If he could help get Rey home with him, he might be able to help him in the future. Looking down at the gold letters on the sweater, he tilted his head. If he was an FBI agent, then he could help other kids in trouble, as well as punish evil. He could help protect them from being trapped in a den of evil and terror. No one else would have to die except for murders. No one else would ever be taught how to kill. Only he would do the killing.

From where she sat on the bed, Rey was looking at him with a question in her eyes as he phased back into the conversation.

He shook his head. She had to answer for herself, at least in front of the agent.

She turned away, gazing up at the taller man. “Okay.”

Kylo saw the agent’s face quirk for a fraction of a second. It was a brief look that could have been easily missed, but his eyes caught it, trained after too many years of looking for the slightest change. His hands clenched in a burst of panic; what was he supposed to do? He had been stuck for so long in a situation that he had understood so deeply that it his feelings were glued to the musty floors he had been forced to walk. Jinn was not Snoke; he was there to help them. The desperate urge to have someone on his side clashed with his pure lack of control. He had survived for so long knowing how Snoke could and would act, erratic as it was.

His shoulders slumped and he rubbed his arm. “Can we go now?”

Jinn nodded lightly. “Mrs. Solo, can you stay with Rey while we’re downstairs?”

Leia sighed, looking from her son back to Rey. Kylo avoided her eyes but still felt them on him. “He wouldn’t want me there anyway.”

 _Whose fault is that_? He wanted to snap. Instead, he clenched his hand into a fist and glared. The tension that was building in his body would hopefully leave his body once he was away from her. Part of him was still torn with how often he left Rey alone with other people. The nurses and therapists, the cops and the agents, and his parents were the only adults they were meeting. His thoughts kept returning to getting away and tried to push them out of his mind. He could be patient. He had to be patient.

He followed Jinn out into the hall. After dully greeting Detective Phasma, he started fiddling with the sleeves of the sweater. He only half listened to the officers as they spoke, joined by an older short-haired woman in a suit. She kept glancing at him and he met her eyes, forcing her to turn away. Whoever she was, he didn’t care to know. Just get this over with, he told himself as they rode the elevator downstairs. Say hi to Armie, and get back to Rey.

His thoughts returned to that morning. He’d finally turned on his phone again that morning. His eyes had blurred at the string of texts from Armie. He stubbornly tried to read through them, eventually giving up and just sending a short message that he was going to wave at his friend at the press conference. He shut the phone off and hid it away again.

He had always been good at reading and writing; it had been one of the few things he had excelled at in school and that had just led to teasing and bullying. When he arrived, he had been the youngest in the house and was quickly cast into Snoke’s insanity, complete with pages of ravings he’d typed out on an ancient typewriter. The typewriter was one of the few items that followed them to new places, he slowly realized as he pieced his memories together and tried to follow the timeline that Jinn had told him about. The other was a tomb that was drug around with them: a Bible. Once in a while, a newspaper would appear. Even just the slightest glimpse into the outside world, or the world that his imagination created from words on a page, gave him a glimmer of hope that he’d have the strength to escape and still make a life for himself. When Snoke realized that he could read, he’d put him to typing some of his extended rants.

 _There is power through pain, suffering._ If he missed a word in the rambling dialogue or misspelled something, Snoke would grab his arm and press a lit cigarette against his skin. The smell of harsh tobacco against burnt flesh was what he thought of now when he just imagined a typewriter. Kylo would have to look deep into the monster’s black eyes to know if he should scream or not. Sometimes, he still guessed wrong.

 _What they did to me, what they still say to me, all of it will end in darkness. I will silence them all. The screams will drown it out._ Kylo never figured out who _they_ were. Snoke would mutter to himself constantly, scratching patterns into the wall with a dull blade. It must have been the police, he assumed after the first few years.

_There is no death, just black nothing. They’ve shown me. Now I have to show the others._

The words, clear on the page, glimmered before his eyes as the elevator door dinged and he jolted from the memory. A firm hand on his shoulder brought him back to what he was walking into. Dull murmurs of many voices from down the hall made him gulp a quick mouth of air. They heard it, even though he tried to hide it. He was being worn down by freedom, growing lazy under buzzing and constant lights. Maybe there were some truths in darkness and his grip on them was loosening.

“Even if they ask you questions directly, don’t answer them,” Jinn said, whispering only to him. “I will take care out it.”

“What if I do want to answer?” He replied, too quickly again. He stilled his face and finished his thought. “If I can?”

Jinn glanced at Phasma and Kylo’s fist clenched in the sleeve of the shirt.

“Just ask me first. Okay?”

He nodded, still conflicted about easily falling under someone else’s command. They talked about that in therapy with Maz. He hadn’t responded, but she somehow understood how he was able to give tendrils of trust to the adults around him, especially regarding Rey. He understood that he needed to cooperate, but the days had worn him down. He was growing less vigilant as he was constantly prodded with questions; even though they were phrased in kind and gentle tones, they were starting to split him open wider than any of Snoke’s blades.

He hadn’t seen the grand entrance to the hospital when they were brought there just over a week ago. It had been blurs of hallways, needles, blankets, EMTs, nurses, doctors, and police. Now, he caught a glimpse of the high, glass ceiling and atrium that would greet normal visitors through the small window on the door. He could see the reflections of green, high above him. They hadn’t been allowed to even peak at the area on their explorations. He understood why. Mixed with the green were blurs of human beings. If he believed in heaven, it was what he’d think it would have looked like: green meshing with blue, unseen and blurred faces. It would just be shapes without consequences.

Jinn and Phasma were talking to the strange woman and he hadn’t been listening, staring up into the empty hopes of nothing. He refocused his ears, still keeping his head up.

“…he’s fine, really,” Jinn was saying. “The Bureau’s psychologist is working with him. There’s progress. He can handle it.”

The annoying woman huffed and he rolled his eyes to himself. “He is distant from his parents and won’t even respond to his name, George. I know that there’s trauma there, but in all of our previous cases like this…”

“That’s not his name,” Kylo called, head still facing the window. He took a deep breath and turned, eyeing the woman. “I saw his badge. That’s not his name.”

He focused on her, but flicked his eyes quickly to Jinn. He was sure that he saw a brief look of pride there.

“You’re right, Kylo. My given name is Quinton, but other people call me George. It’s my middle name,” Jinn said. Kylo didn’t look at him, still focused on the look of growing annoyance on the woman’s sour face.

“So, it’s okay to use a different name if you feel better about it?” He answered Jinn but was still staring at the frowning woman.

“Yes, of course. I still know my name, and so do you.”

“I’m not stupid. I know my name,” he said. “I just don’t want it anymore.”

The woman took a deep breath and looked at the others. “This only proves my point.”

“I don’t think so.” Jinn’s voice was firm and Kylo turned his eyes to him. He felt his shoulders relax at the sound of the other man’s voice. “Go out there and see if they’re ready, Monica.”

Monica straightened her jacket and gave him one last look before exiting the hallway into the atrium. He felt a small victory in that moment, like some of the power was finally his. He’d seen her name badge — she was also in the FBI. She must have been afraid of him. Straightening, he finally felt a taste of balance. It was the same feeling that rushed through him when he first gained control of Snoke and gripped his hands around the old man’s neck, squeezing until he heard a sickly crack.

He took the feeling with him as Jinn guided him through the door. He felt Phasma following close behind him, like they both were guarding him. He heard Monica’s distant voice as they crossed the tile towards the table. His eyes blurred at the faces and flashes made him lose his initial jolt of confidence.

He wanted to stop walking, he wanted to run.

There were too many people.

Too many eyes. Too much judgement.

He faltered, eyes darting to find something secure to cling onto. The table, clad in a deep blue cover, was covered in microphones. Scattered water bottles glimmered in the sunlight, wavering like a mirage. A quick glance at the back wall only showed his face as a child. It was a boy he didn’t recognize. It was the face of a child who had died with the others. Dead and buried, rotting and decayed.

His hands were limp at his side, until he felt Jinn’s firm hand grasping his.

The world paused for him. There was no sound anymore. He felt safe.

He took a deep breath and was guided to the table.

Jinn’s hand left his after a final squeeze, taking his seat at the table. He sat down with Phasma beside him. She fixed her jacket and sat up straighter. He felt her cool eyes on them both as she settled her hands on the table, folding them on the fabric. Focusing on the blue cloth on the table, he tucked his hands under his legs.

“Good afternoon and thank you for coming. I know you have many questions, but we’re finally going to answer some of them now. I’m Supervisory Special Agent George Jinn. I’ve been working closely with Detective Denise Phasma from the Arcadia Police Department, who has been heading the investigation on that end. This has been a case that I’ve been following for years and I’m,” Jinn paused, briefly running his thumb down the corner of his mouth, “I’m satisfied that it’s over. Today, I’m sitting with Ben Solo, who survived the mass murderer, Edison Snoke. We’re here today to answer your questions about our still-ongoing investigation. As well as we can. To a limit.”

There was brief chuckle from the audience. He needed to see how many people were there.

He dared to look up, lifting his hand to wave lightly. It was for Armie, he told himself, as he felt his arm turn to stone as he lifted it. He needed his friend to know that it was really him. He had died and been reformed into this awkward and, apparently, broken person. He had to know that he was still _him_ , despite his ears sticking out and his hair looking wild. It had been longer. It would have been longer if Snoke hadn’t had an idea months ago — it must have been months ago but to him it felt like weeks — that all hair was bad and evil. That idea died quickly and all of their hair grew back and Snoke decided that he didn’t feel any different. The only heads that did not grow new hair were the ones that wouldn’t let him shave them bald.

He saw two skulls that day, flushed into dull light with their owners still crying to live.

Flesh is only loosely bound to bone.

It was all so temporary.

It was just red blotches against white.

That’s all they were.

He had missed half of the questions by the time he came out of his mind.

He had heard his name — _his former name_ — about a dozen times.

Along with a question about an accomplice.

Looking up at the ceiling, he tried to focus on the blurs, the blues and greens. It was all too much, everything was too much…control was slipping through his grasp at the press of eyes all around him.

A warm hand grasped his knee.

Phasma was talking; Jinn wasn’t.

He snapped his head to the older man and wished that he shared the language that he and Rey had developed. There were too many lights and the voices were overwhelming him. He tried to say that in his eyes and to his surprise, Jinn squeezed his knee lightly.

He wanted to believe that it meant: _It will be okay_.

He finally fully heard the brunt of questions after Phasma answered something about the house that they were kept in. It was a rush of voices that he had a hard time following. Monica finally raised her voice from her position in front of the table and pointed to one of the faces in the crowd. He hadn’t noticed her before and was still trying to figure out what she was doing there.

“Can Ben answer a question? I want to know if…”

“Ben has been through so much, as we _said_ , before this press conference…”

He cleared his throat and leaned forward. “I can answer.”

He had cut her off again. The sound from the press made him sit up straighter and ignore how stupid he looked. His hair was too awkward and his ears matched it. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw the picture on the big screen behind him change to his second-grade picture again.

That boy was dead, but he had to speak for him.

Monica cleared her throat. “Okay, what is your question?”

The reporter stood up again and he locked eyes with him. He was trying to figure out why he was there, but gave up because of the light. He couldn’t focus.

“Ben, do you feel like a hero for what you did?”

He felt the eyes of Phasma and Jinn on him as he took a deep breath.

“I, um,” he started, then paused as dozens of flashes erupted from the crowd, “I guess I survived. I stopped him. I don’t think that makes me a hero.”

The reporter nodded and seemed satisfied, sitting down and nodding to the people around him.

They were talking about him, right in front of him. How can you be a reporter and ask such a stupid question? Heroes protected and saved people, even he knew that.

“But what do you know anyway?” He asked, annoyed at how lightly the reporter had taken the entire situation. “He was killing everyone. He was hurting us, brutalizing us. Who can be a hero in something like that? How stupid are you? Do you know what real pain is?”

The room hushed. The sound of shifting broke the silence and it pressed on his growing rage.

These were the evil people that Snoke ranted about. They were the dull forces that drove the world in its monotonous rhythm that was inescapable.

He shot up from his chair and heard it squeak against the tile. “Do you know what it’s like to watch your friends die? To watch _children_ die? Do you know what it’s like to know that you can’t stop it without hurting someone? Do you? _Do you?_ ”

“Ben, that’s enough…” Jinn started saying.

Kylo just stood up straighter, his glare shooting from the audience to the agent. He jutted his chin up and bit his lip, feeling his heartbeat quickening.

Freedom was just another prison, desperate to break him again.

After a final glare at the reporters, he turned and fled down the hallway that had brought him to the meeting. His feet kept him moving as sobs bubbled up his throat. Angrily, he wiped at his eyes as he blindly stumbled across the hospital’s ground floor. He wanted to go outside and get away but couldn’t find the route to the garden again. Growling to himself, he finally found a back, emergency staircase and made it up one flight before falling to his knees. He’d messed everything up again. He was so wrong. His parents should just take Rey and go home. He was never going to get better. Nothing felt like it should.

Pulling his legs up under his chin, he cried. He hated his tears and each one made him want to feel something other than exhausted and mournful. He needed pain; it was the only thing that would put things right.

Turning, he punched the concrete and clung to the sensation that stung throughout his hand.

The door clanged open and he buried his head in his knees.

“Kylo, it’s okay.”

He felt Jinn kneel down next to him and drape an arm over his shoulder. He numbly leaned into the agent, mumbling an apology.

“Why isn’t everything better? Why can’t I do this?” He gripped his hands tighter together, annoyed at the weakness in his voice.

“It takes time to heal, like I told you. It takes time to let others help you. You can’t do this all by yourself. I’m here, your parents are here, and the doctors are trying to help you. They told you about the anti-depressants. I know you don’t want to take them, but they will help you work through this.” Jinn was rubbing small circles on his back, speaking in even tones.

He had resisted taking most of his medicine. He took the ones that would help his body heal; he didn’t want them to mess with his head.

But maybe Jinn was right.

He was so empty. The only light was Rey and he couldn’t take care of her properly if he felt this way.

“Okay.”

“Okay,” came the reply.

He was guided back to his room and collapsed on the bed. Rey pulled away from his mother and crawled up next to him.

If things weren’t better here, they probably wouldn’t be better at home.

But as he held her, he still wanted to try.

 

 


	6. Chapter 6

 

It took another three weeks before they were released.

By the end of it, Kylo didn’t care that they were leaving. Time was jumbled now that he had new routines that rested in another sort of anxiety.

Rey would always want the light on and his mother would always close the blinds. For that part, he was back to never knowing what time it was.

Kylo didn’t think that torture could go beyond cutting, burning, and fear. Now he was trying to reason through a fourth category that wasn’t quite making sense, even though it was something he would never talk about with anyone.

The morning before they were supposed to leave, he tried to organize his racing thoughts. He knew it wasn’t really morning because the hall lights were still dimmed. He took to counting the tiles on the ceiling and awaiting the part of the day he dreaded: actually being alive.

Nothing was getting better, it was only getting more routine.

He’d wake up everyday and only get up to eat breakfast because Rey was frowning at him. Her look would turn darker when he would only pick at his food. He was never hungry. He just felt like the world was static. Despite what the doctors said, he didn’t feel like the pills were working. He’d either want to sleep all of the time, or too exhausted to rest. His eyes were itchy and his heart would start racing. The lights were still filling his ears with nerves and he started to hate the texture of his bed sheets. He’d get in trouble for wandering the halls at night and snapping at the night nurses. That would lead to a long conversation with either Maz or Phasma.

Turning over restlessly, he watched the light rise and fall of Rey’s chest as she slept in the next bed. The gentle rhythm made his eyes lose focus and he drifted off into memory instead of sleep.

His thoughts returned to the worst part about being there and the idea of being sent home: Agent Jinn had been called away a week before they were supposed to leave the hospital. That day, he’d come by their room and Kylo had his spirits lifted for the first time in a while; he’d thought he’d been there to celebrate that they were going to go home soon. But the investigation had to be connected more to the additional evidence that they had found in Colorado. Their last conversation had driven Kylo to tears of frustration, he remembered with embarrassment and then the sting of betrayal. He was being abandoned and left to do everything himself. Jinn had given him a firm hug and he clung to him, not wanting him to leave.

The last thing that he gave him was a leather-bound notebook and elegant calligraphy set, engraved with the words fidelity, bravery, and integrity. It was the motto for the FBI, he had said.

His blue eyes shimmered as he looked down at Kylo, telling him to follow the words and that they’d talk soon.

Then he left.

Kylo still hadn’t opened the book or used the pens in the week between his departure and time when they were supposed to be finalizing going home. They were tucked in the drawer, along with his phone.

Three possessions, that’s all he had.

Rey had received a small backpack with a teddy bear. That part made him smile and then wince in his sleeplessness. She kept the bear perfectly clean and was cautious when she hugged it, always insisting that he help her wash her hands before she picked him up. He knew that he was letting his emotions show when she carefully snuggled the bear up to him on the bed, before climbing in. After her tiny hands had nudged it close enough to rest on his chest, she would finally hug them both tightly and murmur how much she loved them both. It partly lifted his fog to know that there was something else she could love. She slept with it in her bed and hid it under her pillow during the day, tucking it in with her clumsy yet careful hands. The nurses, or whoever made the beds, would try to put it on top of the sheets and he would watch the dread in Rey’s eyes when she saw that it had been moved.

She’d stop at the edge of the bed after coming in from the playroom. She’d plant both of her feet on the ground and swallow a whimper. He could still hear it echo in his mind as he watched her sleep; it always brought any positives he’d felt happen during the day crashing down.

No one understood.

Since he couldn’t sleep through the night, Rey had started sleeping in her own bed after cuddling with him until she was drowsy. Maz said that it was important that they allow some distance so they didn’t retain the total codependency that they shared.

What did that even mean? In his exhaustion, he actually rolled his eyes at himself as he shifted to look at the ceiling. He could only guess what the adults meant instead of actually asking. But why should he show weakness? If they were saying these things to him then he should know what they meant. He wasn’t stupid. He guessed that it all meant that Rey shouldn’t be too close to him.

And he hated it. It was stupid that the adults were pushing them apart. Didn’t Maz see that she had the bear?

Time seemed to slow down during the week after Jinn left; that’s when it all really went wrong but none of it was his fault. Staring blankly at the ceiling, he felt the aggravation at himself for being so weak. He would always glance at his drawer, wanting to write down how many nurses moved Rey’s bear and how often his mother frowned. He still kept the drawer shut. It would take him thirty seconds to pack so what was the point.

And after how badly things went at the press conference, he didn’t want to talk to Armie.

Everything back home was another nightmare. And since he couldn’t sleep, that meant it was real. No matter how many times Maz told him to think about the future and envision it, that just wasn't happening. 

Han was still back in Connecticut. The thought of his father made him punch the rigid hospital bed. Kylo had never asked for an explanation, but Leia would tell him anyway what it was about: there was work (like always), there were changes to the house for Rey (why would that have to happen? She would be in his room), there were meetings with the lawyer (who needs a lawyer? Snoke was _dead_ ), the dog hated the kennel (at least Chewie was still alive). He’d let his eyes slowly fall closed and then open with emptiness as she spoke, at least that’s what he did as he thought about her excuses. He had always hated how his parents would argue when he was younger, but what burned his memories most was seeing them happy when they thought he wasn’t around.

His mind couldn’t let him go and he fell into one of the few memories that weren’t about Snoke.

He’d snuck downstairs during a dinner party once, long ago, and saw them laughing and sharing a kiss and a hug. His father looked over his shoulder and caught him peering down from between the bars on upstairs landing to wink at him.

He must have been four years old.

His father had been his hero up until that point.

But after that, he felt like there was no one to love him. His parents loved each other. There was no one for just him to love.

Now he had Rey.

He wanted so badly for Agent Jinn to come back, he thought as he tore himself from the recollection. In one of his other sleepless wanderings, he looked too long out the far window down at the courtyard and started imagining something other than darkness. He thought about what would happen if Jinn could take them home. The agent had his job; police were supposed to be married to their work. So, he’d work but he would have the rest of his caring to share with them. And Kylo could take care of Rey as she grew up. He wouldn’t have to deal with what he was slowly realizing would happen: Rey was so affectionate and needed to share her heart. She was going to love Han and Leia.

And he’d be alone again.

In that moment, even though he knew they would be leaving the next morning, he gripped into the bed sheets and silently screamed. Why wasn’t this working? He was more agitated than he had been before, but he also fell into nothing easier. He had to hide the swings in his moods from the doctors, who were pressing him to show improvements. Not bothering to learn their names, he enjoyed their displeasure when he acted like he didn’t recognize them. But that didn’t mean he didn’t know what they really wanted.

Rubbing his face, he admitted to himself what he had done and knew it was the only way to survive. Like with Snoke, he learned their patterns and what they expected from him. It took him three weeks rather than a year this time. He was older and smarter now. He took the pills and made them think that he was improving. He’d sit in therapy and actually talked, knowing now that Maz had connections to Jinn, but still held back most of his true, deeper feelings.

The worst part about therapy was when Rey wasn’t there and his mother was instead. The last few sessions, she’d make noises or roll her eyes and he’d have to restrain himself from reacting. He was supposed to care about his mother. He was supposed to do so many things, but it just felt hollow when he tried. Snoke always hated when the girls got too old. They’d smell or scream or make a mess. It had confused him for too long about why Snoke would take the older girls for a night. He was stupid as a kid for far too long, blocking out darker parts from his mind. He knew that what felt wrong was _wrong_ but he never understood girls until he was nine and the girl renamed to Renata explained everything to him.

Snoke was doing something more to them.

It never really hit him how much that threat of violation would build his true hatred until Rey arrived and got big enough for Snoke to start eyeing her.

All of the sounds his mother would make would drag up those feelings. He was almost thankful to have his mother to focus on because there was no way he’d talk about any of this openly. It was something to deal with later.

He’d drive his nails into his leg and glare at her for a fraction of a second before dropping to a neutral expression. Then, he’d answer the question calmly, but felt his inner hatred start to gnaw at him.

He’d have to go home with them.

But he’d already decided they weren’t a family anymore.

That thought carried him through the routine of the morning: he ate a reluctant breakfast to make Rey happy, he went to the therapist and said what he needed to say, then the doctor came and said that they were being discharged early the next morning.

It all rolled off of him into the pit of blackness that he always felt lurking behind him.

And the day stretched on until he just let the emptiness crawl into the places that he couldn’t reach. He used exhaustion as an excuse as he just followed orders. He hadn't slept. He didn't want to eat. He just followed everyone around until Rey was dragging him towards the playroom and he remembered what was supposed to happen.

They were having a small party before they left early the next morning.

Even as he sat down in the chair in the corner, he saw how the other children greeted Rey with excitement and ignored him. He didn’t want to be there but he had to for Rey; she had been talking about it all day; he'd just forgotten in the fog of his mind. The rest of the chronically ill children came and each gave her a small hug in the beginning.

Then everything descended into pure annoyance. He slumped in the chair in the corner and let himself zone out as Rey happily spoke with each child, calling them by name and saying how she hoped that they wouldn’t be _gone_ soon. 

Pulling out his phone, he aimlessly swiped back and forth on the screen. It was the first time in weeks that he had it with him and he felt more numb just holding it in his hands again.

He didn’t even have Agent Jinn’s phone number.

“Do you have games?”

A small voice broke his concentration. A tiny bald boy, who he vaguely recognized from elsewhere in the hospital, stood by his feet, tilting his head at him.

He shrugged. “No.” Why was that important?

The boy squinted at him. “You’re Rey’s brother right?”

Shutting his eyes, he took a deep breath and then gave a small nod. He had heard that question from newer nurses and he was trying to get used to pushing it to the back of his mind. “Sort of.”

“Can I get a game for her for the plane?” The boy reached out his sickly hand for the phone and Kylo gave it to him in a fit of exhaustion. The large phone seemed to grow in the boy’s slight and pale hands.

The boy rolled his eyes. “You’re not even on Wi-Fi.”

He watched as a six year old navigated his device with quick clicks. He called over a nurse and she briefly looked at Kylo before giving him the password. The boy kept the phone until there was a small tone.

“It’s a real fun game,” he said, thrusting the phone back in his direction. “Bye.”

Kylo stared at the phone as the boy ran off to the others, joining the giggling throng of ten other kids.

Looking down at the screen, he eyed the tiny Wi-Fi connection in the corner. It was more distracting than the neon-coloured game app in the other corner. He shut the phone down before the compulsion fully took hold to search for Snoke online. He shoved the phone in his pocket and crossed his arms, letting out a long sigh.

Rey’s head snapped up in his direction. She quirked her head, looking up from her group of friends on the playroom carpet. In that look, he was torn back to seeing her huddled in the corner with the other smaller children only a few months ago. He smelled the mould and the dirt and the fear in her eyes was identical: she knew he was afraid no matter how well he tried to hide it. She seemed frozen, waiting for him to say something.

 _It’s fine_ , he blinked. _Tired_.

_Come play?_

The room was filled with small voices, giggling and passing toys around. The small boy who’d handled his phone was sitting next to Rey and looked up at him with a bright look in his eyes. Kylo knew that the boy was clearly dying; he’d been watching the nurses from his spot in the playroom when they forced him to come there.

He smiled lightly at her. _Okay_.

Forcing himself from his chair he wandered over to Rey and knelt behind her on the floor.

She reached back and put her hand on his.

He let that touch guide him into nothingness to drown out the stares from the other children.

He didn’t say anything until it was finally time to leave.

 

\--

 

Kylo’s jaw ached by the time they arrived at the airport. He had forced himself to keep his mouth shut to stop from shouting at his mother.

She was driving slowly on purpose. It was like she wanted them to miss their flight. All of the words she had said about missing him and loving him were just lies. His father’s absence was all he needed to confirm the same thing about him.

Rey was sleeping next to him in the backseat, her head resting on his lap. The sun was just starting to rise and he watched the sky start to redden. He thought about waking her up as he stroked her hair. She had never seen a real sunrise before.

“Are you going to want breakfast before we get on the plane?” His mother’s voice broke his thoughts _again_.

He shrugged, trying to keep his annoyance under control. “Rey will be hungry.”

“What about you?”

“I’m not hungry.”

She sighed. “The doctors need you to eat more, Ben.”

He was silent, his eyes focusing on the passing scenery. Buildings, trees, streetlights. There were no people. It felt good not to see anyone at that moment.

“Ben?”

“ _Fine_. I’ll eat something when we get there,” he replied, his voice low. “If we get three.”

He could hear his mother counting backwards to herself before she spoke again. “We’re almost there.”

“Good.”

The car was silent again and he basked in it. Rey stirred when they finally reached the airport. He pulled up both of their hoods when they left the car. Phasma was worried about reporters; she hadn’t told him, but had spoke to Leia about it when they thought that he wasn’t listening. It meant taking an early flight, but it probably wouldn’t be enough.

“Just wait here. I’m going to finish returning the car,” Leia said, looking mostly at Rey as she spoke. Rey nodded, but her eyes were darting all over the expanse of the parking lot.

Leia finally looked at him. He saw the pain in her eyes and frowned. She really didn’t want him anymore. The feeling hadn’t come to him overnight. Even during therapy, Maz would ask constantly about his parents. He knew that it meant they were concerned about why he didn’t want to be around them. Even with the medication, he still didn’t feel like they actually cared about him. They cared about Rey and that was important. He clung to that as he continued to fake through appointments.

Now, standing in a silent parking lot, holding Rey’s hand, the full dread of going home settled in his chest.

“I’m hungry,” Rey said, squeezing his hand. “Where’s home?”

He looked down at her and tilted his head. “We’re at the airport. We’re taking a plane to Han and Leia’s.”

“That’s home?”

“For now.”

“Maz asked me something dumb.” Rey pouted and shook her head. “Am I supposed to call them mom and dad?”

He sighed. Maz had even brought that up with him and for once he spoke honestly with her. “I don’t.”

“Okay.”

He heard Leia’s shoes clacking across the pavement and shifted to watch her approach.

“We’re all done. Get your things and we’ll get going.” She looked pleased with herself and it annoyed Kylo. How hard is it to return a car?

Leia had bought him a small leather satchel for the trip. Rey had her backpack. He was determined to not have more things than what could fit into those bags. The plan to leave was always lurking in the back of his mind. It would still come to him when he couldn’t sleep, which was often.

In the long walk into the terminal, he kept Rey close. The glass and metal made everything appear like it wasn’t real, like it was just surfaces with nothing behind them. They kept walking by people hurrying with giant luggage; each one looked exhausted or annoyed, typing angrily on their phones. He kept following his mother and bit the inside of his cheek. They were fully dependent on her. She had all of their information. No one trusted him. He could have done this on his own, but no one had given him what he needed to know.

His mother stopped, gazing up at the massive information board. Rey’s hand tightened in his. More people were arriving, streaming past them in every direction. She shifted closer, grabbing onto his leg until he lifted her up.

Leia was still scratching her head and he groaned.

“It’s this way.” He gestured to the left.

Leia glanced over her shoulder. It was like she was questioning how he could know.

He rolled his eyes. “I saw the piece of paper in the car. With the flight number.”

Leia gave him a guilty smile. “I guess I should have told you instead of…”

“Yeah, you should have.”

He turned and started walking towards the check-in desk. He heard her behind him with her obnoxiously loud shoes. Rey tugged on his sweater and he slowed his pace, letting her catch up.

Anxiety was pressing on his lungs when he saw the line. He shifted his weight and glared at the two dozen people ahead of them.

Leia gently touched his arm. He was too exhausted to jump at her touch.

“We can use the priority lane,” she said, lightly. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that either.”

He exhaled and trailed behind her up to the desk that had no line.

The clerk smiled at them and then went through all of their information. He tuned out her voice, it was too high pitched and oozed of fakeness. Her smile was too big and her make-up was too thick. She looked like a doll.

“…all right, your gate is B14. Have a nice flight.”

He watched his mother thank the woman and he had to follow her again. His feet felt heavy in the new shoes that his mother had made him put on earlier that morning. There was so many voices and noise around him and he tried to narrow his focus on her voice to keep himself from shutting down. She was telling Rey about how they’d go through security next and how there would be people there, but no one would hurt her. Rey was quiet, not wanting to get down from Kylo’s arms. She still nodded, even though she clung to him. They were sharing their nervousness. No amount of doctors and nurses could fix them; they would have to do it themselves.

The airport was an endless hallway, fake light mixing with real from above. He hugged her tightly as the security line came into view. He’d flown before, he kept repeating to himself. It was about having patience. He remembered squirming as a child, bored with long lines and people pushing him. Now, he kept his focus on just standing still and waiting.

Someone behind them bumped him and he spun, locking eyes with him. It was just a kid, he couldn’t have been much older than he was. The other boy’s eyes widened when he caught Kylo’s glare.

“I’m sorry,” he quickly said. “My bag fell over…”

Kylo just turned without saying anything, fixing his eyes on a stray thread on the back of his mother’s jacket. Her hair was starting to spill out of her carefully braided buns. Tilting his head, he watched her reach into her bag for their tickets and saw the three passports follow with them.

“Where did you get that?” He asked. They were almost at the front of the line, but the sight of the documents pressed on the already open wound from earlier.

“Oh, Agent Jinn was able to fix the paperwork for us. Don’t you remember when they took your picture a few weeks ago?” She tried to sound like it wasn’t something important, but it was. There were too many things happening behind his back.

He just looked at her blankly. “What does Rey’s say?”

They were finally at the front of the line and his mother just shook her head. “I’ll show you on the plane. Not right now.”

His eyes blazed as she turned away from him to put her bag in the small plastic bin. He watched it start to roll down and was thankful to have Rey in his arms. His hands clenched around her and she let out a little squeak.

“Ow, Kylo.”

“Sorry, love. You have to get down now anyway.”

Her sneakers hit the floor and she stumbled and his rage turned to panic. She shoved his clumsy hands away and picked herself up, casting a look his way.

“I can do it, Kylo.”

She sounded just like he did. It made him smile, despite the stress from having everyone behind them in line starting to shuffle. He shut them out; Rey deserved to take the time that she needed. He took Rey’s small backpack, containing only her bear. She didn’t question why he needed it. “You need to wait to follow me, okay? Just wait and then listen to the guards.”

Rey firmed her lip and nodded, gliding her eyes across the crowd ahead of them. She spotted Leia and finally looked up at him with a more confident turn of her chin.

“Sir, you’re next,” one of the guards said, pointing at his and Rey’s bags. He put them on the belt and watched as the guard scooped up the two bags and put them in a bin. Embarrassment burnt his cheeks as he walked towards the metal detector.

Nothing happened as he walked through. He looked up and around.

“Keep moving, you’re fine.” The guard on the other side spoke to him, waving him forward.

His feet felt heavy but he managed a strong stride forward before turning to wait for Rey.

Framed in the huge detector, with a crowd milling behind her, he saw how small Rey looked in the world. She pulled down the hood on the white hoodie and looked from one guard to the other as he was motioning for her to come towards him. She walked through and didn’t look afraid, filling up the space around her with a confidence that he didn’t know that she had.

Nothing beeped and she gave the guard a grin. He stood at the end of the band and she strode up to him and grabbed both of their bags, standing on her toes to reach them.

She turned and gave him a little frown. _Okay?_

 _Okay._ He blinked back, taking her hand.

Leia was looking at them both, smiling, as Rey navigated by a man struggling to put his belt back on. Kylo had just ignored him and Rey had stepped carefully aside.

“You handled that like a pro,” Leia said, still smiling. “Good job, Rey.”

Rey didn’t answer. She just nodded.

“I think that you’ve earned some breakfast.” Leia was already leading the way towards the gate. Kylo was still lost in the image of Rey looking both small and vulnerable and filling up the space at the same time.

Soon, she wouldn’t need him anymore.

The thought clung to his heels as he shuffled into the line behind his mother. He stopped listening as Leia read the options. It was all fast food. Rey’s eyes would grow wide at every suggestion and she tugged on his hand for help.

“The sausage is good,” he finally said.

“Okay, then three of those. With the hash browns. And two orange juices and a coffee,” Leia turned to speak with the clerk. Kylo narrowed his eyes.

“I want a coffee too.”

Leia couldn’t hold back her sigh. “That’s not good for you and you know it.”

Frowning, he shook his head. “Then I want to buy one myself.”

Leia’s mouth was set in a firm line as she looked at him. He watched as her look softened as she studied his face. She finally nodded and turned away, wiping at her eyes as she paid the cashier. Rey had been watching everything and tugged at his hand again.

 _Leia loves you_. Her eyes blinked quickly, forming a word that they normally only shared about each other.

 _I wasn’t mean_. He answered, then thought. _Was I?_

Rey shrugged. _You’re you._

_But was I mean?_

She was struggling with her answer and looked from Leia’s back, then to him. _A little_.

He watched as their orders were placed on the tray and his mother turned. He tried to give her a small smile; even though it felt forced, he watched her face brighten again.

As they were sitting down, he turned to Rey again. _Tell me when I’m mean._

Rey nodded and then turned to her food, happily switching from one mode to another. He looked down at the small wrapped package in front of him and did his best to hold back the heavy exhale at the smell of the food. Feeling his mother’s eyes on him, he peeled open the wrapper and took off the top bun. He reluctantly started eating the half sandwich.

“This used to be Ben’s favourite when he was your age, Rey,” Leia spoke up. “Every Sunday, this would be breakfast. We’d have to get up early and then we would eat in this park…”

“Can we go there?” Rey asked, after sipping at her orange juice. “After the plane?”

Leia’s grin spread across her face. “Rey, we’ll do anything that you want. We need to go shopping for clothes and see what you like.”

Kylo watched them talking as a memory from his previous life snaked its way into his head. A conversation between his parents. How his mother always wanted a daughter.

He’d fought and killed his way out of a hellhole. His skin had been burnt, cut, scratched, and bruised. He knew the smell, taste, and feel of death. The way that flesh would rot and sink into bone was one of the constant dark shadows that kept him company when he wasn’t angry. The pills had brought those thoughts out more, nagging on him not to be mad or sad but just relive what had happened in Snoke’s prison. Maz would ask him about his dreams and he’d tell her as little as possible, only mentioning that they were dark. She would sit back, take off her glasses, and told him to start making up a different story before he went to sleep. How he needed to imagine going back to school and seeing his friends. It burned him inside to admit that she was right. Really, seeing Armie and doing something normal were the only positive daydreams that he could come up with. That and doing things with Rey and watching her grow up _normally_. He’d stop his parents from leaving her alone, or at least make sure that she wasn’t alone. She would never be alone like he was.

Leia looked at the table and then motioned that it was time to go. He saw that the sun was filling the sky now. It was early, but at least it was light out. The pilots could fly the plane better and they wouldn’t crash and die.

Rey let go of his hand to grip her backpack straps, giving him a self-assured smile as they followed Leia towards the gate. Her footsteps slowed by a coffee stand. She turned and handed him $5.

“Buy yourself your coffee, sweetheart.”

He took the bill. Rey followed him up and then turned to keep speaking to Leia.

He stood and looked at the menu, frowning at how many things there were to read. Shaking his head, he finally looked at the clerk.

“I, um,” he paused, feeling himself getting red in the face. “A small coffee.”

“No problem. $3.55 please,” the clerk smiled at him, despite his embarrassment at not even being able to order something in under a minute.

She handed him the foam mug and he blinked at it.

“Is there something wrong?”

He felt the weight of the cup and how it fit in his hand. “I just…I never bought a coffee before.”

“It’s early. We all need our caffeine, right?” The girl was pretty. Her brown hair framed her thin face and her eyes were almost a kiwi-coloured green. She must have been something like twenty but he felt a little pleased with himself as she smiled brightly at him.

“Yeah, right.” He picked up his mug and sipped at it. He gave her one last look before turning back to tell Rey about how he actually felt happy about doing something normal.

But instead of his mother and Rey, there was an angry looking businessman standing behind him in the line.

He was alone.

He darted out of the line as the man shoved him. He took two steps to the side and could only hear his own heart beating. It thundered in his ears as he walked backwards until his back hit a wall. There were people streaming past him, not caring about the panicked look on his face. He could feel his warm breath on his lips as he exhaled; the feeling got faster and faster as tightened his grip on the paper cup in his hands.

He was left behind again.

There were too many people with too many secrets wandering around.

All he could hear was his own heart and his breathing. The sounds matched the distinct rhythm he darkly remembered from climbing the stairs down to Snoke’s basement for what he thought would be his death.

Desperation finally forced his mouth open. “Mom!”

He scanned the crowd, searching for any sign of her.

“Mom!”

After the second shout, he finally saw a greying head emerge from a door. A washroom.

He had only been half listening. But Rey needed to go to the washroom.

Leia had heard him and hurried over with Rey springing ahead to hug him. She had heard him and his fear. She could see how he looked.

“Oh, Ben, I’m sorry, I thought you heard me, but we…” Leia was rambling and he instantly shook his head and ran his hand through his hair. It was damp with sweat. He heard his mother continue to talk and then shook his head again.

“It’s fine.” He kept his voice low. “I’m sorry for yelling.”

He ran his hand through Rey’s hair and took a long sip of coffee. It was bitter and tasted awful, but he didn’t stop. Leia finally quit trying to make an apology and reached out to rub his arm.

“You can always call for me, Ben. I didn’t mean to…”

“I know you didn’t,” he interjected. “Can we just go now?”

Leia kept her face neutral. “Sure. We should be boarding soon.”

Rey held his hand the entire way to the gate. She kept trying to meet his eyes but he tried to make it look like he was distracted by all of the people around them. There was always some old man that would remind him of Snoke at every gate that they went by. The sunken eyes and bald head just brought him back to where they had been, and where he still felt like he was.

When they finally sat down, his cup was empty and he was feeling the opposite of energized. Rey climbed onto his lap as Leia went up to talk to the gate workers. He watched how the determination set in her face; even though he couldn’t hear what they were saying, he could tell that it was something for them.

“Were you scared before?” Rey snuggled against his chin. “We thought you knew. Leia said…”

He kissed her forehead. There were no lies. He could never lie to her. “I was. I wasn’t listening. I was…I wasn’t thinking. That’s why you always need to listen. I don’t want you to be afraid.”

Rey nodded, her small hand reaching up wrap her hand into one of his curls. His hair was too long but he never wanted her to stop doing what she wanted to. “I won’t. Sorry you were scared.”

“It’s okay now.” He was finally feeling tired and having Rey in his arms put him closer to actually sleeping than he had felt for weeks. “We’re going home soon.”

“Will I be scared on the plane?” Rey was sounding tired too. Her head was drooping on his chest.

“Maybe. You won’t know until we’re on it. But I’ll be there. It will be okay.” He took a deep breath. “When I was…worried before, everything was okay when I saw you again. We’ll always have each other. Things are less scary when you share them.”

Rey nodded. “Like when we were at Snoke’s. Everyone shares. So it hurts less.”

“Yeah, angel. Just like that.” He said as Rey yawned and put her head back down on his chest. Her breathing slowed down and he felt her fall asleep.

Leia finally came back and sat beside him. “We’ll be boarding soon.”

He didn’t even have the energy to snap back at her. “Good.”

 

 


	7. Chapter 7

 

His room was the exact same.

He’d spent years feeling the memory of the place start to fade and blur, tainted by skinned knees on dirt floors. Some of the other kids would cry and whine for their old homes, bringing up their rooms and their families. They would always want to go back; he just wanted to get out. But still, the memories clung on, leeching away his strength. It was clear in the beginning — then it had been beaten into a fraction of a remembrance that had to be tucked away in a corner of his mind that hadn’t been touched by darkness.

If he didn’t think about it, then maybe it would be okay to never be there again.

But as he sat down on his bed, which had been too big when he’d left but now looked small, he felt like he hadn’t been gone for all of those years. He took a deep breath as the emotions rolled over him. Even when he’d opened up the back door and came up the mudroom to the kitchen, it hadn’t felt real. He only had Rey’s hand in his as he took deep breaths and crept into his brightly lit house. Only it wasn’t anymore. It had been his parents’ before he was born and only his for such a short period of time. But everything was where it more or less should be. When his parents decided that he should be alone — _and why should they get to decide_ — that he could take the tentative steps into his room. There was no one else there. It was only the four of them. But they were still telling him what to do. Rey was chatting with his mother, looking at her room across the hall. He heard her. He wasn’t afraid for her. The new fear that rose up was being overwhelmed by his lingering nostalgia. It was more like being away for a weekend or a sleepover. The echoes of screams and ripped edges of pain were still there, lurking, except now, they were sandwiched between his life before and what he was now. Running his hand along the bedspread was like having the sunlight warm his face when he’d pulled Rey outside; parts of him that he thought could no longer feel were still intact, but muffled.

It was a sensation that Kylo never expected.

He wanted to be more confused. He wanted to be more angry that nothing had changed. He wanted to be more enraged that Rey was somewhere else without him.

Instead, he just felt empty.

At the same time, the void was hazy. He stared at the wall of his bedroom, an annoying acorn print that he never liked, and tried to figure out if he was there or not.

On the plane, he’d almost decided that he was a ghost. It would have been easier if this were some version of the afterlife. He was already dead. He might as well accept it. He was crammed into a barrel in the basement alongside all those he'd let die. 

His face was blank, but inwardly he felt a faint spark of hope at seeing the book he’d left on the nightstand still sitting there, waiting for him.

Maybe he wasn’t dead after all.

How could he be dead if he hadn’t finished reading that book?

He reached out, brushing the cover. It was a silly story about a dog trying to find his way home. It wasn’t his first chapter book. This book had been one from his grandmother so it was different from the others that his parents had decided for him. He had wanted to finish it before baseball camp.

It was still there.

He wasn’t dead.

His father cleared his throat from the doorway and he pushed the sensation down, frowning as he turned.

Han looked uncomfortable, shifting from where he stood.

The last time he’d seen him like that flashed in his mind. It was an argument about how he hated math homework, and how he couldn’t get anywhere without math.

As he looked into his father’s grey eyes, he realized that he needed a lock for his door.

“We’re going to get you a new bed. But you need to settle in first and then we’ll pick something out. It’ll be something that you like instead of, well, whatever we would have chosen,” Han said, trying to lean casually against the door. His hands gave him away. He had shoved one into the pocket of his jeans and the other was motioning aimlessly. “I’ve already looked at beds and none of them were you, son.”

Han had been nervous the entire drive from the airport. Kylo had been silent, actually more content to be exhausted than anything else. No one on the plane had recognized them. Rey had looked at everyone with determination, studying them for him. His lingering anger at himself for calling out for his mother had left him distracted, dwelling on how useless he had felt in the moment of panic. It couldn’t happen again. He numbly let Rey show her strength, looking for dangers that he was too weary to evaluate and judge. Kylo had felt his helplessness rise as Rey’s own exhaustion took hold. She was fighting tears by the time the other passengers had finally taken their seats.

He had to remind himself that she was allowed to cry.

He couldn’t. But she could.

Especially in the real world.

People were loud and took up too much space. Looking at his father now, all he saw were their faces again as memories from the plan took hold. Even as his eyes grew heavy and his thoughts ebbed from anger to emptiness, he managed to pay some attention to the world that he’d have to help guide Rey through when they reached the other side. These people weren’t all dangerous in the ways that they were used to. Most didn’t look at one another as they passed by, ignoring anyone who needed help with luggage and instead focusing on their phones or steadfastly looking anywhere else. The others had faces flushed with annoyance at having to wait for anyone or anything.

They were sitting at the front of the plane.

He saw everyone.

And now he was seeing that same emotion briefly flash on his father’s face when he didn’t respond.

He saw the dust rise in the late afternoon air as his father exhaled.

He let the moment stand, enjoying the rising tension as he kept his eyes locked on Han’s. His father never gave up an argument and would try to bargain his way through anything. He would start talking without knowing what to say when his mouth first began moving, however in the end he usually won over whoever he was trying to swindle or charm.

But there were no words that he could use on Kylo at that moment.

When Han finally broke eye contact for a brief second to glance out the window, Kylo nodded.

“It’s fine,” he said, “I guess. For now.”

“Good.”

Han turned and left and Kylo sighed, the air leaving his lungs with the slow satisfaction of giving his father what he deserved.

He heard Rey’s footsteps and managed to smile, wiping the blank look from his face when she walked gingerly into his room.

Rey tilted her head and smirked at him. Her hand reached for his as she stepped to the edge of his bed.

“I need to…an ask,” she started, pausing to take in his room. “Why two?”

Kylo shook his head. “It’s not my idea. I’d change it if I…were allowed to.”

Rey frowned and he helped her up to sit on the edge of the bed. She should be asleep. She had dozed lightly on the plane, curled up on his lap. He had allowed himself a few moments of sleep that were constantly interrupted by the sounds of breathing all around him.

Tight, dark spaces and deep breaths were an eerie constant that he realized he’d never be able to outrun.

“Are we free now? In our house?” Rey took in his room before settling her eyes on him. “I don’t want two.”

“I’ll find a way. I won’t let them make all of the decisions.” He hugged her to him and heard a pair of footfalls descend the stairs to the lower level. The shouldn't have two rooms, but here they were. There would always be someone deciding how he should be. Until they could get out of there. But then what? Would it always be running, the second he felt uncomfortable or panicked?

Rey nodded, snuggling closer to him. “I’m hungry.”

“Dinner is soon,” he said, stifling a yawn. Having Rey’s warm body next to him brought his exhaustion to the surface. The heaviness of the layers of his mind rose in his chest and he couldn’t resist the pull towards sleep. He didn’t need to ask Rey as he shifted to stretch out on the bedspread. His feet were almost at the edge; he ignored his father’s words as Rey settled next to him.

“I don’t understand.” Rey’s head rested on his shoulder and her small hand gripped his shirt. “Today's strange.”

“I know,” he replied. “I don’t feel like I’ve ever been gone from this place. It’s all the same, except for me. I don’t fit anymore.”

He rubbed her back as he closed his eyes. The memories came as a rush: The knob was the same to the backdoor, but he didn’t have any problems reaching it. His feet had firmly hit the floor of the backseat of his father’s silver truck like they'd never done before. The railing up to the kitchen from the mudroom of the back entrance couldn’t have been moved, but it felt so much lower and awkwardly placed.

His toe brushed the edge of his bedframe and squeezed his eyes shut, willing the tears not to come.

“You don’t fit ‘cause we’re two now,” Rey mumbled, letting sleep win over her questions. “Need to make it bigger.”

“Yeah,” he answered, kissing the top of her head. “We will have to do that.”

 

 


	8. Chapter 8

He woke up when he felt Rey stir at the sound of his mother’s voice softly calling from the doorway. He would always find Rey before her.

“Wake up, kids. Dinner’s ready. And we have a few of guests we’d like you to meet.” Leia’s words were clear yet still echoed dully in his ears. “You know them, Ben. It’s nothing to be worried about.” But he’d heard the familiar creaks in the hallway from the landing to his room. He didn’t realize he’d been awake for longer than he grasped until he had counted back all of the sounds in his mind.

The light flicked on as he sat up.

He didn’t remember turning it off.

They had watched them sleep.

He bit back the annoyance and tried to put it into what he’d heard from the therapists. They were supposed to find routine. It was all about adjusting. That word had come to the forefront during their last few weeks at the hospital. Doing the same things over and over again was supposed to help them. Yet, at the same time, he was floundering in it. He mostly blamed the pills. He would take them, trying to trust Agent Jinn, despite his lack of contact. He hated the pills. They were supposed to make him better and he still felt like this.

Sitting up, he wiped at his eyes. Rey was already awake, but not moving. It was like any other wake up back at their torture chamber: Snoke would storm in and scream at them, or would hiss at them without words. Should he tell his mother about this? Should she know? Waking them up like they were normal was what they were supposed to do. But, he couldn’t. This wasn’t the hospital with its controls. Here, they were at their assumed home. They had rooms now; it wasn’t just a bit of floor to curl up on and wake up afraid of what was to come. And still, his mother awoke them with a rapid knock on the door and an intrusion into his space.

There were lines that he needed to draw.

Maybe he could do that now.

“Are you okay?” He managed to ask, shifting off of his bed. He narrowed his eyes at another change. There was a stack of books at his desk. Tilting his head, he watched Rey get up and stretch, her tiny arms hardly reaching up towards the ceiling. Her broken arm had long healed, but a brace was still there, keeping her together. He saw it peaking out from beneath the awkward pajamas they’d slipped her into

She wasn’t wearing that before.

They couldn’t touch Rey without her wanting it. Were they stupid? Were they evil? How could they do this do her?

Still, he focused on the books, trying to keep the rage at bay: chemistry, biology, English, calculus, history. Between each subject were extended study guides. How did they get there? He didn’t remember them from before. It was another act of betrayal. His parents were acting in favour of what they wanted rather than what would work. Sure, he wanted to study. He wanted to finish school and move away. Part of that thought made him look up at the mirror across his room and then quickly turned away. No, they shouldn’t just be guessing what he wanted to do.

He longed to call Agent Jinn and hear if this was something that he’d thought up and told his parents to do. It would make sense then. It would all fall into place. Someone at the FBI knew more than his big-talking, minimal action parents.

Rey was running her hands over her clothes, breathing in quick gulps of air. Someone else had touched her. With all his parents talked to their therapists, they clearly heard nothing.

“I wouldn’t have let them do it if I’d been awake,” he mumbled, stepping away from the bed. “They’ve moved around things here too. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.”

Rey looked at her legs, her tiny hands still tracing up and down the strange fabric. “I…I don’t…ugh.”

She gave up turning to him and blinking quickly how she felt. _No one_ should touch her if she wasn’t awake. No one should be in her room or his room if the door was shut. She didn’t know the word privacy, but she knew space. She knew that there were places where others could and could not be.

“What will make it better?” He finally asked, aloud.

She sighed, tilting her head. A tiny smirk broke her serious features. “Food.”

“Then let’s go. You can yell at them about the pajama things. Leia just does what she thinks will work. And it doesn’t,” he said, reaching for her hand.

For once, she frowned before slowly rising up from the bed. He scooped her up into his arms and kissed her cheek. It was all he could do. He was tired and locked off from his emotions; he blamed most of that on the stupid pills he’d been taken. Agent Jinn had promised that they’d helped him feel better but why hadn’t it made anything right? Instead, he’d just felt tired or stunned. He’d either tumble through panic, or he had slid through something that should have been overwhelming.

Now, instead of wanting to yell or fight against his parents, he had only blankly looked at the books, at the way someone had changed Rey without telling them. Annoyance was there, sure, but the blind anger he was used to feeling since the taste of freedom had faded.

He wasn’t sharp.

He couldn’t protect them and that’s _all_ he had left.

He shut the door to his room behind him, hugging her closer as they neared the top of the staircase. Kylo searched his mind at the voices that he heard and his slow pause made Rey hug him tighter.

One was familiar; he’d only heard it a few weeks ago.

Armie was here.

When they emerged from the protection of the hall, he felt too many eyes on him. Briefly, he pushed his face against Rey’s neck and then sighed, too curious not to see the face of a friend who he thought he’d never see again.

To his surprise, there were two other people at the table, other than Han and Leia.

“Grandma? Grandpa?”

His voice felt soft, lost in the past, as he took in the faces at the table. The teenager, with shocking red hair and a wide-eyed look on his face, must have been Armie. He’d changed. He was almost a grown up. His jaw was firming and his hair was nicely combed. Kylo’s feet stilled and he hugged Rey closer. People weren’t supposed to change.

Still, Breha and Bail Organa were rising to meet them at the end of the staircase, shifting from the light of the kitchen table to the darkness of the hallway.

“Darling,” Breha said, tears springing to her eyes. “You’re home.”

Kylo took a deep and cautious breath. “Rey doesn’t know you. You need to…introduce yourselves. If she’s okay with it, I mean.”

Armie still lurked in the background, shifting closer to Leia and Han. Kylo, in the back of his mind, filed away how he was suddenly taller than is childhood friend. But maybe that was because of the staircase.

Rey hugged him tighter and he slowly sat down at the top step. Breha and Bail, with their expressive eyes and neatly pressed clothes, slowed at the bottom of the staircase.

“Hello, Rey,” Bail said, resting his hand on the railing. “We’re Ben’s grandparents. We’d like to eat dinner with you. If that’s okay with you, and you’re hungry.”

Rey lifted her head, eyeing the dark-eyed main. The moment drew on as she studied everyone downstairs, Armie included. She finally sucked in a deep breath and then turned back to Kylo.

Her eyes were pleading for him to ask who had undressed and redressed her. He softly answered that he’d do it once they were downstairs. With a guarded look, she accepted and he stepped down the final few steps. A hateful look took over as he eyed his parents.

“No one can take off her clothes if she’s not awake,” he said, ignoring the looks from his friend and family. “You don’t know what we’ve been through.”

Leia, to her credit, stood up and nodded. “It will never happen again. She just looked so…”

“And don’t go into our rooms. Ever.” He lifted his chin, firm eyes shifting from his mother to his father.

Han licked his lips. He saw Armie shifting uncomfortably at his side until Han finally nodded. “We won’t. Come and eat. We’re going to…do what you…we’re going to make sure you get what you need from now on.”

That wasn’t an answer. His eyes burned, but his mind couldn’t find the same rage that he should feel at the betrayal. He was defending Rey only because she couldn’t do it herself. All of this made him just want to go back to sleep.

But, inside, he knew he couldn’t show weakness. With one final kiss to Rey’s forehead, he set her down and he lifted his head to the people around the table.

Armie was the only face that he could focus on.

Until the Organas took his attention away from the boy with the lingering features of his friend, but the body of a teenager, back to his love. Was that how he looked?

Dropping to his knees, he settled beside Rey as Breha slowly neared them.

“Hello, Rey. I’m Ben’s grandma,” she smiled, her brown eyes crinkling in the faint summer sunset steaming in from the front windows. “You must be wondering how I know you.”

Rey shrugged and pursed her lips. “But…not mine?”

Breha, reaching out for Bail, frowned and then shook her head. “We can be yours too, if you want to. You’re welcome in this family, dear.”

Rey’s forehead creased, trying to work through all of the new information. A pang of guilt crawled through his body. How do you explain grandparents when parents were never really established? He wasn’t sure anymore what he’d told her or what the others had told her. He wanted to keep his head down but there were too many eyes on him. All of them were familiar and he couldn’t avoid them. Weakly, he met Armie’s eyes. In the brief look, he knew that he was the same friend he’d left behind at seven years old. At the edges of his gaze, he was still the same friend, his only friend, who’d helped him at baseball and listen to his strange stories in the backyard as he dreamed about flying away into space. He watched as Rey slowly eyed all of the adults in the room, her hands curling into fists.

“I…can I eat and…make answers?” She asked the entire room in a voice that only he knew that she could possess. “Answer questions, I mean. I’m not dumb.” The ability to process everything that was happening shouldn’t be something that she was capable of and yet, here she stood, looking forward to eating and getting it all over with.

With her gentle eyes, his grandmother stepped back, his grandfather following. “Well, we hope you like lasagna.”

As if Rey knew what it was. He still half hugged her and stood close the table. He gingerly looked at his friend to apologize as Rey found her seat and the other strange, younger, face at the table.

“He’s my best friend,” Kylo said, empty confidence quickly draining away. “I hope that you still are.”

Armie looked to Leia and then quickly back to him. “You look so different. But yeah…I never stopped missing you.”

“I missed you too,” he mumbled, slouching down.

The table was set, like it always was for family dinners. He’d sat in this seat so many times, eating breakfast, lunch or dinner. But something was missing under his feet.

“Where’s Chewie?”

Han and Leia had sat down at either end of the table. Han bit his lip and lifted his greying eyebrows.

“He…passed away, son. He was an old dog. But you know what? He was always looking for you. Everywhere we’d go, whenever we’d get home, he’d go straight to your room. He died beside your bed. He wanted you to come back and now you’re here.” The pain in Han’s voice almost shook him. Almost.

“You couldn’t even tell me that _my_ dog died? And then you _lied_ about it?”

The bitter tone settled around the table until Armie cleared his throat.

“My parents got divorced. I was alone a lot. I used to take Chewie for walks. I took care of him for you. Don’t worry,” his friend said, sitting up straighter.

He met the other boy’s face and the treachery shuddered loose. “Thank you.”

After a long, extended silence, his mother nudged a serving spoon in his direction. He nodded, realizing how hungry Rey must be. He quickly filled up her plate, taking only a small portion compared to her. She eyed the garlic bread with an expression of unbridled excitement. She took a bite and grinned at him.

“It’s good,” she giggled. “How much can I eat?”

“All of it, sweetheart. All of it,” he replied, instantly handing her his piece.

Rey ate and he picked at his food, listening to the adults talk. They were trying to discuss mundane things, but his head perked up at the talk of lawyers and police. His mother noticed and she nodded at him. Armie mirrored his motion as he sat up, clearly curious about what had happened to his friend.

He didn’t know what he’d done.

He hadn’t just materialized from space.

“…but the law in California, Leia, you can’t deal with that with a family lawyer?” Bail had his elbows on the table. He took a long drink of red wine. Kylo quirked his head at the man; he never drank before, as far as he knew. But he only had dumb kid memories.

“We’re getting help, Bail, and since they were taken across state lines, it’s not just California that we’re dealing with,” Leia answered, firmly, before taking a drink from her own glass.

He looked up at Armie, quirked his eyebrow, and lifted his water glass. The other boy smirked and mirrored him.

Across the table from one another, they clinked their glasses.

Breha cleared her throat. “So, kids, what do you want to do first, now that you’re home? Do you want to meet with lawyers, like these boring people are talking about?”

Rey was flicking at a tomato on her plate. “Can I see a horse?”

“A horse? Oh, we’ll take you to the pony ride at the fair!” Breha was ignoring the guarded looks from around the table.

Kylo leaned over to Rey, wanting to remind everyone about where they’d come from. “Tell her about who told you about horses.”

Rey nodded, then quickly looked at her lap. “A girl came one day. She kept crying and Snoke smashed her. He smashed her real hard. She was on our floor and Kylo took care of her. She told me about her horse. He was white and really pretty and big. Then she went away. He killed her ‘cause she was crying.”

This time, the silence was deeper and more cutting. He heard the shifting of feet and the sounds of wine glasses meeting lips.

“We’re going to take you to a horse, Rey,” Han said, sitting up and clearing his throat. “And it will blow your mind.”

“I’d like that,” she said before lifting her head.

Leia stood from the table, starting to gather the plates. “Why don’t you kids go upstairs and play. We’ll call you when grandma and grandpa are leaving. If it’s okay with you?”

Kylo was already standing, reaching to scoop Rey into his arms. Then, he paused. “No dessert?”

Leia, her hands filled with dishes, gave him a broad grin. “Armitage, grab what you brought. You can eat them in B-…Kylo’s room.”

The other boy nodded, only pausing slightly, before reaching for a plate of brownies on the counter. The three were heading up the stairs before his friend whispered a question about his name.

“I…um…I can’t be Ben anymore,” he finally answered as he closed the door. “I can’t tell you everything that happened, but I’m…I don’t even know. The therapists try to tell me what to do and say and _think_ and I’m…I don’t know.”

Rey was sitting on the bed, munching on a brownie. “You’re Kylo. I’ve only known Kylo.”

Armie shuffled his feet and then sat down on the floor beside the bed. He looked from his friend to the television on the cabinet across from the bed. “Han made me set up some games. Can we play and talk? I’m…I also hated my name. Everyone calls me Hux now. At least, everyone who understands.”

The tension in Kylo’s shoulders loosened and he nodded. He grabbed a brownie from the plate resting on the bed and watched as Armie, no Hux, turned on a gaming system. His friend handed him a controller and he finally felt more at home.

“Wow,” he said. “It looks like a movie.”

Hux glanced over and smiled. “You don’t even know, man. You don’t even know.”

He sat back, watching Hux start playing, declining to try at first.

“I hang out here a lot, since my parents split up.”

Kylo nodded, glancing up at Rey on the bed. Her eyes were glued to the screen, amazed at rush of lush graphics and a very real world of a man cutting through a forest with a sword.

“I’m sorry,” he managed to say.

Hux paused the game and looked at him with wide eyes. “Don’t say sorry. I read what happened to you guys and it sounded…I don’t even get most of what happened. I saw the press conference, but they cut out the part when you...yeah...from the clips so nobody really remembers that, don’t worry. How are you still alive? A divorce won’t kill someone. A crazy fucker does.”

Blankly, Kylo stared at the images, stilled on the screen. “He…he…I can’t even believe that we’re alive. This doesn’t feel real. They’re making me take these stupid pills and there have been too many doctors. I don’t even know who I am anymore.”

After a short sigh, Hux started the game again, letting the dull music kill the silence. “They made me see doctors too. And take pills. My grades were sucking and I didn’t want to do anything. Dad was gone and he hated mom. Who does that? They’re supposed to be in love and then he’s just leaving?”

Slowly, Kylo nodded. “Thing’s aren’t supposed to change.”

Rey tapped his shoulder. “Sleepy. I’m sleepy.”

He nodded and stood. “We need to brush your teeth.”

Scooping her up, he heard Hux clattering his teeth. “You should say goodbye to your grandparents. My stupid therapist is trying to teach me to think about others and how they feel good…or something.”

Rey, in his arms, shook her head. “Will they feel better? If we do?”

Hux looked up at her and smiled. “They want to get to know you. They’re nice. They bought you guys this.”

His head was cloudy as he emerged from his room. He saw the adults at the table, drinking coffee. Both Breha and Leia looked tired, eyes still lingeringly red. He cleared his throat at the top of the stairs.

“Rey’s going to bed. She wanted to say goodnight,” he said before Rey nudged him. “ _We_ wanted to say goodnight. Can Hux stay over?”

Leia looked up and then nodded. “We’ll call his mom. But I’m sure it’s okay.”

He brought Rey down to the last step and sat down again. Breha and Bail stood, looming over them.

“Goodnight, Rey,” Bail said, extending his hand. “It was wonderful to meet you. We’ll see you tomorrow, and also see what we can do about that horse.”

Breha seemed to be holding herself back after Rey had shook his grandfather’s hand. “You’re a wonderful girl. We’ll be here for you, we promise.”

Rey sat on the step, looking at them, until she nodded to herself and turned to climb the stairs again. Kylo looked at them both, briefly shook his head, and then followed her.

“Adults suck,” he said, the second they were inside his room again with the door shut. “They just keep doing things that they think are right.”

Hux laughed lightly. “At least they don’t change.”

“I’ll be right back,” Kylo replied. “I need to make sure Rey is okay.”

Rey was looking between the two and had a thoughtful look on her face as they left for the washroom. He wasn’t surprised to find a small pink toothbrush and children’s toothpaste waiting for them. He handed her the brush as he sat on the edge of the tub. She had quickly gotten a hand of how to brush her teeth since their escape. He’d taught her, even though the nurse’s had tried.

“I like him,” Rey said, foam spilling over the edge of her mouth. He laughed, an actual laugh, as he reached to help her up to spit and rinse her mouth.

“He won’t go away, I promise.” His voice was still light as he looked at their reflection in the vanity. This part of routine he could handle.

Back in his room, he settled Rey onto his bed. Under the covers, he kissed her forehead. She played with his hair and giggled as her eyes drifted shut.

“Who is she?” Hux finally asked, quietly, after she’d fallen asleep.

“She’s Rey,” he replied, settling beside his friend. “I want to try playing now.”

Nodding, his friend quickly exited the game. “Okay, we’ll do the companion mode. We help each other.”

“I was watching you.” Kylo took the controller and settled into the game. “This is…weird.”

“So weird,” Hux answered. “You know, we had a memorial for you at school. You were just gone. I didn’t think that you were dead, but they made us talk to all these counselors and shit. And it was so dumb. They made us plant a tree for you and I thought it was the stupidest shit. If you were dead, why would you care about a tree?”

Kylo was fumbling through the game, but Hux was there to clear up anything he didn’t finish. They worked through the quests and he gradually learned the path and the point of what they were doing. There was a treasure at the end. Despite the advanced graphics, it was the same thing they’d played as kids.

“What happened to the tree?”

“It died,” Hux said, a low giggle starting in his throat. “It died so fast. Then they secretly replanted another one because kids are stupid and were upset that the tree died.”

“Of course it would die.” He turned to grin. “But I’m not dead.”

Hux sighed and then paused the game, thrusting the controller aside. “I still don’t believe that you called me.”

“You could have told me that you’d be here,” he answered, cautiously. “The stupid doctors keep talking about trust and I’m…everyone is the enemy to me right now. My parents, they put Rey in those pajamas. They shouldn’t have done that. Snoke would always….”

His voice trailed off.

He took a deep breath. “I shouldn’t have said his name.”

His bottom lip started to quiver and he felt lost. He didn’t want to cry, he couldn’t cry. But, it was still there. What if he’d taken Armie too? What if he’d been forced to help end his friend’s life? What if he’d been help to carry his body and dump him into a barrel? What if Snoke had done to Rey what he had threatened to do?

A whimper escaped his mouth and Hux reached his arm behind his shoulder, pulling him closer.

“Sometimes the doctors are right. Sometimes, you can cry.”

He still bit back the tears, shaking his head. “He killed everyone. If you looked at him the wrong way, he’d kill you. He ripped my fingernails out. He cut up my arms until I couldn’t feel anything. He broke my arm and would burn me until I screamed and he would just laugh. He took the girls and would…”

Hux just held him. He was like one of the others in their space. He could talk to him. He wasn’t just an ideal-filled adult.

Finally, the dam burst and he wept. He cried, shakily into his friend’s shoulder. He grabbed onto him, feeling arms settle around him as he did.

“It’s okay, Kylo. You’re safe now. Really safe.”

Shaking his head, Kylo sat up, a hiccup escaping his mouth. “But why do I feel like this? Like things can’t stop? I feel tired, then I feel angry, but then I can’t _get_ angry?”

Hux just nodded. “What pills are they giving you?”

He quirked his had. “I don’t know. I’m too…there’s too much to do and I didn’t ask. I don’t want to take them.”

Slowly, Hux shook his head and then sat closer to him. “When my parents broke up, two years ago, they put me on these pills that just made me feel awful. They didn’t help. I started tricking them. You just pretend to take them. You shove one off to the corner of your mouth, swallow the water and then spit it out. I didn’t need them anyway. It’s like you said, adults just think what they want. I’m okay now. And you’ll be okay. I see my dad once a month, but I have my mom and your parents. And our friends.”

Kylo frowned. “They’re not really my friends. They haven’t seen me in…forever.”

“No, no. They really want to see you. We’re having a party at Paige’s, next week. I’ll add you to the group chat.” Hux sat up and let out a happy sigh. “Paige has a little sister, Rose. Maybe she can be Rey’s friend.”

“Why do you care about Rey?” He asked, wiping away the last of the tears from this nose.

“She’s…like your sister. I want her to be happy too. Or at least, um, normal?”

Looking up at the frozen television, Kylo nodded. “We’d like that.”

A careful knock broke their tableau and he sighed before grunting a response.

“Armie, your mother is here to drop off your things for the night,” Han said, looking at how close they were. Kylo shifted away, glaring.

“Thanks, Mr Solo,” Hux answered, standing up. “Do you want to say hey to my mom?”

He shook his head. “Tell her thanks from me.”

“For what?”

“For everything.”

Alone, Kylo quickly moved to change. He noticed how half of his closet was filled with newly purchased clothes, still with the tag, while others were still what he’d left behind. There was always change, but in some places, no change. With frustration, he grabbed a pair of pants and a t-shirt. They fit. He eyed himself in the mirror and let his shoulders sag. He was too tall and too thin. Rey needed food more than him.

Hux returned, a bag slung over his shoulder. “She says hi.”

“I guess she at least looks the same?” he asked, sitting on his bed, beside Rey.

Hux moved to turn off the television and gaming system, before opening his sleeping bag. He spread it out and Kylo frowned. He grabbed a pillow from his overfull bed and handed it to him.

“Thanks, man.”

Hux changed quickly and Kylo turned away to study Rey instead. Just looking at another half-clad body brought him back to the death house and the smell and ache of pain. When Hux cleared his throat he turned back.

“Do you still play baseball?” he asked.

Hux laughed lightly as he laid himself down onto the floor. “No. Soccer. You’re going to be good at it. And hey, I’ll help you with school too. We can study everyday.”

Kylo shoved himself under the covers and shrugged. “You want me back in school?”

Nodding, Hux sat up, resting his head on his hand as Kylo looked down at him. “I helped Han with the books. You can have my notes from last year. My dad thinks that I suck at school but I know a lot more than he thinks. My dad…I miss him…but…”

“He shouldn’t tell you that you can’t do something,” Kylo replied, finally putting his head down. The emotions still bubbling in his chest, he let out a thought he wanted to keep secret, but his mouth wouldn’t let him. “Are you really still my friend?”

“Yeah, of course,” Hux’s response was quick and then he paused. “When I came to your house, after you were gone, it was like everything didn’t make sense. I thought you’d be home the next day or something, but it kept going on and on. Your mom and dad…they were so sad. I didn’t think that they’d ever be okay again. Like, I’d come here and walk Chewie and they would still just look the same. Everyday, it was like their hurt got bigger. I know that I’ll never know what happened to you, but I am your friend. You’re a hero. I wouldn’t have survived.”

Kylo met his eyes, realizing that tears were threatening to rise again. Thankfully, a soft knock came at his door.

“Come in,” Hux called, after Kylo waited too long, lost in thought.

“Everyone settling in here?” Han asked, poking his head through the door. “Rey’s not in her room?”

“She’s fine here,” Kylo’s voice felt hollow as he answered.

“That’s…okay. Just brush your teeth and go to bed. We love you, Ben.” The last statement disappeared with the closing door.

“Do you believe him?” Hux asked, sitting up.

“I don’t know,” Kylo answered. “I want to figure it out, and I just can’t.”

After forcing themselves up to brush their teeth, accompanied by playful shoving and comparing who was taller, they went back to his room. Hux sighed, looking up at him with a small grin.

“Maybe you, me and Rey can figure it out.”

“I hope so,” he replied, before reaching up to turn off the lamp beside his bed. "Goodnight."

"Night."

For once, darkness wasn’t so empty.

 


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo tries to navigate the world, still struggling with the past.

 

Kylo woke up to someone shoving him. He jerked back, ready to reach for Rey and take the beating. Grunting, he gripped his hands across his face and held his breath.

Instead of Snoke, Hux stood there with wide eyes beside his bed.

“You were…sorry. I guess you shouldn’t wake up someone who’s having a nightmare but…” his friend started rambling out of embarrassment, but Kylo just sat up and shook his head. He took a deep breath and tried to calm his heart. He couldn’t remember the dream that he had just escaped from, but the lingering fear had left a bead of sweat rolling down his back.

Gazing around the familiar, yet achingly uncomfortable room, he sighed. “No, this is just how I wake up.”

Ignoring Hux’s curious gaze, he glanced at the clock. 6 a.m. Groaning, he flopped back down. With a huff of frustration, Hux slowly sat down on the floor and looked at him with tired eyes. He leaned back against his closet, causing the slatted door to rattle. It was strange to be in a place where such a simple sound could make so much noise. Even after the weeks in the hospital, Kylo still strained his ears for the faintest gasps or strangled screams. Instead, there was just silence, broken only by Hux drumming his hand on the floor.

“Guess it wasn’t a dream,” Hux mumbled. “Guess you’re really home.”

He was fully awake now, sore but well rested. His body was always tense, the lingering breaks and wounds were healed by now. Yet, some of them didn’t quite agree with how he moved and slept. Turning, he reached out and rested his hand on Rey’s chest. At least her body wouldn’t suffer the long-term pains that he carried. He had felt her wake up in his panic, but now she was breathing steadily again, back to sleep. She was adjusting easier. Rubbing her pyjamas, he tried not to think about how long it would take for her to sleep in her own room. But at least he could sleep last night with her by his side.

“Guess I’m not dead,” he whispered, taking a quick glance at Rey’s face. Her cheeks were fuller. She looked younger now than she’d ever done. When she was an infant, after the moment Snoke had forced her into his arms and threatened to kill them both if she cried _too_ much, Kylo had felt a new, if only, reason to live. He had to keep her alive and get out. There were few kindnesses that Snoke had showed them, yet Rey’s arrival had given him a new purpose as well: he wanted to see if an infant could survive there. Looking at Rey now, with her almost chubby cheeks, he fumbled internally to understand the darker future that he’d stopped. All of the older girls had suffered terribly, but still what he did to the boys…what did he want? 

“I, um…” Hux started. “I didn’t get a chance to tell you last night…”

“What?” His head snapped away, broken from the hazy vision of the dark stairs down to the basement.

Hux was still tired, his head lagging to one side. His messy red hair was sticking out over his forehead. He wasn’t looking at him, but his eyes finally lifted when Kylo shifted on the bed.

Hux looked guilty as he spoke. “They got you guys a new dog. It wasn’t for _you_ like, for a present, but they got it like a month before everything happened. I wasn’t supposed to tell you but…but they were supposed to give it to you last night, but there were too many reporters and…”

Narrowing his eyes, Kylo leaned forward. The urge to intimidate Hux was too tempting and he felt a blossom of joy grow in his chest as Hux leaned back, cornered under the intense gaze.

“Rey gets to name it.” The words came easily as he lowered his voice.

He glared for a few unbroken moments until he smirked and Hux lost the fear in his eyes. He broke out into boyish giggles and Kylo actually grinned fully. Rey woke up, rubbing her eyes as she looked at them.

She slowly focused on him and laughed, her smile warming the room with the sun filtering in between the blinds. “You’re happy.”

With a brief smile to Hux, he turned. “Not really. We just made a joke.”

“You’re not happy…at home?” Her face dropped and she looked at him with deep confusion. He wasn’t happy yesterday. He wasn’t overjoyed the entire way home. Despite what he’d promised her, he’d just been a disappointment.

He faltered in his answer, struggling to find what to say to her. He had said so many things over the years that they mingled with the internal promises that he had made to her in his head.

There was a sudden pressure at his feet. Hux sat at the edge of the bed, folding his legs so he could sit between them, but at a distance.

“Rey, I um,” Hux paused to look at his hands then back at her again, “I just know a few kids your age. I’m kinda glad my parents didn’t have more kids because they…yeah…um…I think that Kylo and me, we are best friends. Sometimes, we can joke and stuff. He will laugh, but he won’t be really happy. Like, there were a few times when I was really upset about my parents’ divorce and my other friends would make a joke and I’d laugh, but everything after, everything would just be…sucky.”

Rey turned her head. “Kylo says that. The kids at the hospital say that. I don’t know what it means.”

Kylo frowned, watching how Hux and his angel interacted. She knew that he wouldn’t be going away. It wasn’t like any of the other kids. In the peace of this house, despite the edges haunted by lies, she could have her real life.

Rey then scrunched her face, unable to hold a lie for long. “I say it too. So I think I know what it means.”

Hux just kept his face neutral. “Exactly. Sometimes you just say things until someone tells you it’s wrong. When I was little, like you, I always tried to be like other kids I thought were cool. It’s not wrong if someone else does it too, right?”

Rey, puzzled, let out a long exhale through her nose and sat up. “Nope. I need to pee.”

She was up and off the bed before Kylo could move to follow her. She stopped at the door and quickly turned to look at him. His heart was already beating faster so he was glad that she could take care of herself. He gave her a quick tilt of his head, telling her just to call for him and he’d be there.

She left the door half open and he heard her soft feet pad down the hall. Her steps were steady, only pausing once before the dull thud of the washroom door shutting let him relax. Hearing none of it, Hux sighed and ran his hand on the blanket.

“How do you guys do that?” He asked, his breaking voice low.

“We had to learn how to talk without words. But I still taught her to talk. She had to talk to the other kids so she’d figure out the outside. I had to get her out,” Kylo said, ending with a shrug. Trusting his friend had come so easily, why stop now?

Hux bit his lip and nodded. “This is still so weird.”

Kylo could only bob his head and wait for Rey to return. The sun was steady through the window and he was breathing. This was life now.

 

\---

 

His pills were laid out for him beside his breakfast plate. He caught Hux’s eyes across the table and he raised his eyebrows, quickly, before looking down at his toast. Rey had already swallowed her medication down, followed by a good clunk of chocolate milk. She was tracing her finger down her slice of Nutella on toast before Leia turned to calmly explain not to play with her food, not because it was wrong, but because it made a mess. Han was reading the newspaper, sipping on a cup of coffee. He had felt a brief pang of relief to see coffee sitting beside his plate before he was reminded of the pills.

He took the first two. One was a vitamin. One was a painkiller. He still needed those.

Those two went down with orange juice.

The last one, the evil one, he put in his mouth and tucked up under his lip. Leia was busy with Rey, Han was muttering about the baseball prospects. Only Hux was watching him.

But he knew his parents were still watching him out of the corner of their eyes.

The pill was in and he drank the juice.

He waited a few minutes, glaring at his breakfast as the pressure under his lip started to build.

“It’s just peanut butter,” Leia finally said, sitting across from him. “Would you like something else?”

Tilting his head, he took a long look at her. Narrowing his eyes, he focused on her hairline; her eyes were too dangerous this early in the day. He finally shook his head no and she sighed, standing to retrieve more coffee. That’s when he took the chance to spit the pill into a napkin.

If he could do this every morning, he’d finally be able to fix the hollow parts of him, he hoped.

“Hux told us about the dog,” he blurted out, trying to distract everyone from what he’d just done. “When do we get it?”

His friend sputtered into his juice. “You didn’t have to tell them!”

Rey’s ears had perked up. “A dog?”

With a low groan, his father let the paper fall onto the table. With devilish eyebrows, Kylo sipped his coffee and met Han’s eyes.

“You just lost dog-walking privileges for life, Armitage.”

He was sure that Hux was just pretending to be angry when he mouthed _asshole_ in his direction.

Leia had her arms folded and was leaning against the counter. “We haven’t had time to pick him up from the kennel, but Luke will be getting him for us and bringing him by tonight.”

Rey was still digesting what was being discussed around her. He was mainly focused on the fact that his parents had kept another thing from him. Even worse, they had left the dog alone with strangers. Setting aside the bitterness in his mouth, he tried to concentrate on Rey. She looked at Kylo with wild eyes and he quickly grinned at her. _You’ll love having a dog._

_Really?_

_Yeah._

“Start thinking of a name, kids. He’s going to need one,” Han said. “Armitage doesn’t get a vote.”

 

\---

 

Luke showed up that evening, complaining about the drive and the news vans parked outside the house. Hux had reluctantly went home that afternoon, but reminded him of the party at Paige’s before he left.

He was happy to have a distraction by the time that Luke arrived.

His uncle had grown a beard. His hair looked grayer and his eyes seemed tired. He looked at them both with curious eyes before he set the juvenile Irish Setter on the ground.

It wasn’t exactly the puppy that he had in his mind, but it yipped and wagged its tail and ran straight to Rey, who held her ground and grinned when she kneeled down. The dog, still small and filled with energy but _not_ a puppy, licked her face in between happy yips. Then it turned and scratched underneath its chin before turning back to Rey.

She started petting the dog, running her hands through its fur. At first, he’d thought that she’d be afraid. Instead, she happily accepted the new pet into her life. She looked at Kylo with a joy that he’d never expected. A pang of jealously rattled in his chest as she kissed the dog on the side of his muzzle. He licked her again and then trotted over to Han and gave him the same greeting. Leia sat on the landing of the stairs, talking over the event with Luke. He could still feel his uncle’s eyes on him as the two spoke. The dog walked up to everyone, but him.

“He’s got mumps,” Rey said, running her hand through the dog’s fur. “He’s all mumpy.”

“Do you mean lumpy?” Luke asked, smirking.

Rey looked up, met his eyes with a slight frown, then nodded and returned to petting the dog.

So they named the dog Lumpy.

 

\---

 

Kylo didn’t want to go to the party, but there wasn’t much keeping him in that house. He was afraid to leave it, but it was that fear and Rey that kept him from exploring more of the world. The new dog hated him and his parents had still lied about the old dog. He wanted to demand more independence for his parents willingly deceiving him, despite how uncomfortable he felt out in the open. Moreover, he was achingly jealous of how the dog loved to follow Rey around and how much she enjoyed hugging him. Now, he had Rey and the dog in his bed. He didn’t exactly mind; Chewie would always sleep at his feet. They would have to sneak the dog for walks, which he only reluctantly went on so Rey could get enjoy the fresh air. Luke would quite often drive them to the dog park to avoid the news crew. They were still there, and he had watched his father give a statement on the front lawn one day. A man in a suit stood at his side; Kylo guessed that he was a lawyer.

His mother and father still had to use the back door to enter the house and he would watch the reporters lurking outside of their home with an sense of satisfaction that made him question himself. Why did he want them to hurt? Why did it feel good to hear his father mumbling about those ‘fucking vultures’ whenever he came home? All he wanted for so long was stability and now the taste of chaos made him crave more. Even when the reporters followed them to the dog park, forcing them to drive to one an hour away, his fear was overridden by the grim dismay of being hounded.

Maybe that’s why he agreed to go with Hux to the party. They had left, after Leia had looked at them with eyes that bore the absent hurt of a dull blade twisting in a wound that was just starting to heal. But Rey had just looked at him with pride and curiosity as he tucked her into bed, his bed, shortly before he dared to leave his house. Lumpy wagged his tail at her side. He reached down to pet the dog for one of the few times since he’d come barrelling into their lives. For once, he wasn’t met with a growl.

There were other changes too. They were only good if they were with Rey. Rey had helped him pick out the clothes he’d wear that night. Between buying things for the dog, they’d been shopping for themselves. The mall was just as aggravating as he remembered it. People were slow and plodding, taking up time and space. The stores were either too bright or too noisy. He hated trying on clothes because everything was either too short or too big. But Rey had frowned every time he’d grumbled. She had told him to go with Hux. She had looked at him with eyes that sang that she wanted to be there with him, but understood why she couldn’t.

It was a big kid thing. 

That didn’t change.

Even on the outside, they were still separated by the decade between them. It was only in their world, in that prison, that they were one.

Armitage tapped his arm and he shook himself out of the memory of putting Rey into bed. It was still his room, but the lights were left on. That made it more of her room than the space across the hall. In his daze, he accepted Hux’s touch.

Since they had been back, she had only played in that room, deciding which toys she liked and disliked. Legos were on the pile of _like_ , while dolls were tossed to the side. He had sat with Rey during her ‘experiments’, as they called them in their wordless speech, and watched as she stripped each doll of her clothes and tossed them aside. She looked at the dolls intently, asking him if they were gone. He told her that they’d never been there, so she didn’t have to worry. Still, she would stare at the faces for minutes that felt endless. Finally, she’d put the dolls aside, all of them faced down. The days were like this, shopping, eating, playing with the dog in the backyard, and learning what Rey liked, but the nights were still spent with him. They’d read in his bed and he’d help her change into her pyjamas.

It wouldn’t take long for Han and Leia to do something about it.

He had already heard them talking.

They had already insisted that Rey take baths by herself in the evenings. He could shower in the morning. The least they could do was be open about why any of that made them uncomfortable. He couldn’t understand the problem. He knew that they were hiding their suspicious gazes and kept their conversations behind closed doors. They didn’t understand that he’d learnt how to spy through a pure need to keep breathing. How to hear through walls and understand whispers, dwarfed by distant screams, would help him know who was alive, dead, and what Snoke’s mood was. This wasn’t spying from the banisters and seeing stolen glances and embraces. This was about survival.

He knew what they thought of him and it rang clear why they wanted him out for the evening. Luke had started staying in the basement guest room and had spent the time since he’d arrived in their house. He didn’t want to talk to his uncle, but he couldn’t avoid him during dinner. Even the walks in the dog park gave him moments when he could be alone, but dinner was a trap. The looks between the adults told him how messed up he was.

He would never be normal, no matter what they said and did.

He’d always hear silence in the house at bedtime, knowing that they were all downstairs and listening. They wanted to make sure that he wasn’t hurting Rey behind their backs, in the deep and painful way that was the focus of all therapists. The sexual side of Snoke’s abuse was something that he thought about, but couldn’t figure out how to sort it on the list of agony. The girls always got it worse. That was the thing he kept telling himself.

All the girls, but Rey.

He’d made sure of that.

“Are you okay?” Armie’s voice was still unfamiliar to him but he was getting used to it. They had hung out almost everyday since they came home. Kylo had taken his advice and used it since that first morning at he breakfast table. He wanted to clear the cotton from his mind. He was tired of everything feeling hollow or too much. The words from others still floated to him and he needed to focus on how to react, but he hoped that in time he’d begin to feel again. He wouldn’t call Agent Jinn a liar, because he wasn’t. The doctors were the liars and they had fooled him too.

Walking under the streetlights, blocks from his house, he thought again about how his friend had changed. He almost wondered how he sounded, but he pushed the feeling away as they trudged under the dim streetlights.

Paige’s house was three blocks away. At first, the thought of going to a party — a real teenage party — had brought him out of the fog that had filled his head since being back in the world. Now, getting closer, he was being pulled back into going anywhere but to that house. The week without being on that evil pill had finally brought back his emotions, but in a better way. His nervousness was now more focused; now, he could finally clearly see what was happening around him. He was afraid for a reason. He questioned how they could still be his friend if they knew what he’d done the last seven years. He had avoided looking up anything about the case, but there must be stories out there about them. The reporters were there for a reason.

There would always be blood on his hands. No party could undo that.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” he mumbled. He finally pulled down his hood, taking in the warm summer air. He ran a quick hand through his hair and wondered if his mother would let him go alone to get it cut. “Just strange to go anywhere.”

Armie smirked. He’d been patient to a near-breaking point the last week. But they had still reconnected and got to know one another. Armie, or Hux or whatever, would come over with a bright smile and kind words to Leia. After she’d disappeared to do whatever she did in her office on the main floor, his mood would sour, instantly ranting about how unfair his father was. He was always angry that his father didn’t want to spend any time with him, even thought they lived in the same town. Kylo could listen, but struggled to understand why he felt nothing about his friend’s rage. When they were alone, the tide would change again. This was the Hux he preferred; he could get along with someone trying to get him interested in some comic or television show that was unfamiliar to him. At least he could probably watch or read it and decide himself if he liked it.

“I know you’ll get used to it. We are just going to hang out. It was Paige’s idea before you get worried that it was you mom.” Hux had his hands in his pockets, his eyes briefly turned away from him.

He managed to huff in response, hoping it sounded positive. “If it’s anything fun, then it wouldn’t be her idea.”

It wasn’t Leia’s idea. She had insisted that he bring his phone. It weighed heavily in his jacket, reminding him that his only rescue would come in the form of people he didn’t trust.

“Exactly!” Armitage grabbed his shoulder and grinned. “It can be like this all summer. When you get a bike we can...”

“I don’t want to go too far,” he said, sharply. When he realized his tone, he frowned. “I don’t...I...”

He let the thought trail off and his friend squeezed his shoulder again,

“That’s cool. We can just play games at your place. So Rey can be there, right?”

“Yeah. She’ll like that.”

Armitage nodded and let his arm fall away when Kylo held his eyes too long on his arm. “Your mom wants me to go to therapy with you.”

His feet felt heavy and he cast a dark gaze as he and stopped walking, exhaling at the thought. He shuffled on the loose gravel on the sidewalk, filling the silence of the suburbs at night. There was nothing but the two of them, a distant garage door opening, and the crickets in the early evening of a dawning summer.

“I said no,” Armitage replied in an instant. “Not unless you want me too.”

Kylo shoved his hands into the pockets of his jacket. The tight fabric still didn’t sit right, but at least it was black. “I need to…” he paused and looked up at the sky again, “…think about it. Therapy sucks. They keep telling me what to do and what to think.”

Armitage tilted his head, frowning. “Then you’re really going to hate school.”

He smirked slightly. “I need school. I don’t need therapists.”

They stood in silence for a few seconds, shoes still grinding into the gravel of a darkened driveway. He really wanted Armitage to understand, but still kept things from him. When he told him about Agent Jinn he realized that he had trusted too much. He would have to keep that part to himself from now on. He still wished that he had the agent’s number. Kylo knew that he would find it one day, once he actually dared to open up the laptop that sat on his desk. Right now, he preferred to live in the idea that Agent Jinn would come by the house and say that there was some mistake. He and Rey could go and live with him. Maybe he liked dogs too…

“Come on, we are going to be late.” Hux’s voice broke his thoughts. That was another thing he should have gotten used to by now. Everyone was always talking, not just begging or screaming. It was strange to crave a silence that was never really peaceful.

He sighed and started following his friend again.

The Tico house was smaller than both his and Hux’s houses, but it wasn’t bad or anything. In his distant memory, he thought it had been bigger. But it had a porch. And Paige was waiting there. Her dark hair was pulled into pigtails and she was wearing jean shorts and a white tank top. She tilted her head as she noticed that they were nearing her home.

“I thought you guys got lost or something,” she said, grinning. “We are in the basement. Mom doesn’t want Rose to wake up. Um, hi Ben. Maybe you don’t remember me but…”

He stopped at the base of the steps, hands still in his jacket pockets. He met her eyes and tried to look pleasant. “I remember you Paige. Your mom made those ginger cookies.”

Paige’s face lit up. “I knew you would remember me! I’m so glad that you’re back, oh my God, you don’t even know…”

He let her fade off into chatter as she smiled. She flipped her hair and he watched her fold her arms across her chest. She still looked like the girl that he knew but she had changed even more than Hux had. It was harder to find the face that he knew in her half-grown body. Her light top hardly covered her stomach. She should be freezing in the early summer air. He could easily follow Hux’s eyes towards her torso; instead of being enticed like he was, Kylo instead thought of the poor girl who he’d seen stripped naked on Snoke’s basement floor. She must have been the same age, echoes of a child in a half-grown body. Instead of Paige’s long, clean locks, this girl had hair matted to her face, caked with blood and snot. She had screamed and pleaded and scratched at Snoke’s face as he bit at her cheek. Detached, he had stood in the corner, trying to think of anything but being there in the low light that only meant oncoming death.

The scent of the room would always change when someone was about to die. The air was sharper somehow, more bitter.

The screams echoed in his ears as the other two stood there, laughing about something.

Hux cleared his throat and he managed to nod his head. They followed Paige around, down towards a back door. Kylo eyed it and felt Paige at his side.

“There’s a private entrance. We used to rent it out. Then, it was for when I got home late from practice. Dad still wants me to be a dancer but it’s not working out. Now it’s just where we hang out. Is that okay?” She sounded too concerned about how he was doing. She was constantly fiddling with her hair as they walked up to the door.

He heard voices and music behind it.

If he could be seven years old again, this would be everything he’d dreamed of when he thought about being a teenager. He had always longed to be older, to be taller and faster, and to be able to do whatever he wanted to. Technically, they had snuck out of his house tonight. It wasn’t from his parents, but from another annoying force that he couldn’t control yet bitterly enjoyed. As he breathed in the fresh night air, he quietly wished again that he hadn’t died with Snoke. He wanted to reach for Ben and not be Kylo, but that boy was dead. Instead, he had to perform in his shell. But the wreckage that he navigated wasn’t as broken as everyone thought. He thought about Rey, tucked safely in a bed back at home, a happy dog at her feet. He’d made that happen. He could get through a couple of awkward hours before fleeing. At least no one would kill him on the way out.

Paige gave him a long look with a pained smile on her face as she opened the door, still talking to Hux about how Holdo hadn’t given her the right grade in homeroom and how she was so glad to be out of her class…

He let it all wash over him as he stepped into the low light of the rear stairwell.

A grouping of faces that he once knew sat along the opposite wall as their feet creaked against every step. Each one seemed to freeze when he walked in, dipping his head as he let his eyes adjust and his anxious heart calm. The rapid hammering of his heart had started the moment the door had opened.

“Holy shit,” a boy with a familiar face said. “You’re really here.”

Hux shot quick eyes to him and then back to the boy. “Yeah, Doph, I’m here. Calm down.”

Pausing at the end of the stairs, Kylo took in the people in the room. He had to know who was there, where the exits were, and where the clear threat was. Snoke had, once, forced him into the basement while blindfolded. He had stamped on the floor and tossed dirt in his face, screaming at him to know _where_ he was and _what_ he was holding without sight. Just having his eyes opened lifted him from that space. Now, in another basement, he just saw a bunch of kids, Doph Mikita among them. Kel and Elia Tehar sat up a little from the tattered sofa to look at him. He recognized the siblings at once. But the final blonde head of Liza Tharen made him still his face, preventing the dawning frown.

Liza, the elementary school classmate who had always followed him around.

Liza, who would steal his pencils.

Liza, whose tank top was even shorter than Paige’s.

He narrowed his eyes at her and then turned back to the others, the dread causing his hands to curl into fists.

“I have a problem with basements,” he managed to say.

Doph nodded. “Yeah, um, I saw that on the news. When you…freaked out…”

Taking a deep breath, he took the final steps in two firm strides. He took off his jacket and tossed it in the corner. He was tired and annoyed, already feeling Liza’s eyes on him. The space was small, but not cramped. Feeling enclosed anyway, he sat on the floor, beside a beanbag chair across from the others. He watched Hux settle into it and held back a smirk. It reminded him of Rey and Lumpy. The brief note of joy was swept away just as quickly as it came when he felt Paige settle beside him.

“So, everyone is here now. And no more talking about our friend here. He’s not a freak, so stop it you guys.” She lifted her head and nodded to herself. “What were you guys talking about before we got here? Was it Holdo’s stupid hair?”

The tension was finally broken by light laughter. Still, he didn’t let himself relax.

His T-shirt itched as he watched the others start talking about the last year at school. The last year had been spent, missing his birthday, Christmas, and everything else, being threatened by death unless he did what he was told. He could hear his heart beat in his head as he looked around the room. But still, no one was asking him anything. No one wanted to know. As the realization took hold, he scratched his eyebrow and then lifted his chin.

“Is this supposed to be fun?”

Paige, still sitting beside him, touched his leg. He tensed and she carefully took her hand aside. “We’re just talking…”

“No, I…” his breath caught in his throat and he sighed. “I don’t think I know how to have fun.”

The admission made his chin drop. Feeling his cheeks warm, he rang his hand around his wrist.

“We can play a game! Oh, mom made snacks. Get a game, guys, I’ll be right back.”

The second Paige had jogged up the other staircase, his other exit point, he watched as the others rolled their eyes. He was doing everything wrong. He couldn’t figure out what to say or what he had to do.

“Her mom will come down,” Kel said, finally breaking the silence. “She’s going to want to hug you. She was down before, already talking about that.”

“I don’t do that,” he answered. He smoothed his hair back and shook his head. “Why does everyone always want to touch me? I don’t get it.”

“We just want to know that you’re here, Ben,” Liza said, sitting up straighter and jutting out her chest.

“Kylo,” Hux added.

“Huh?” Doph asked, after sipping on his pop bottle. Where did he get that? Kylo spotted the table in the corner. If Doph had one, that meant he could get a drink, right? They were in the open and not locked away. He felt a brief spike of panic when several pairs of eyes watched him amble up to the drinks. He grabbed a bottle of coke and silence followed. The others started chatting about something else and he he let out a satisfied breath. Twisting off the top, he took a tentative sip, feeling the bubbles fluttering against his tongue. He’d tuned out the conversation fully and studied the strange landscape painting on the wall behind the table. A lake at night, the moon reflecting on the surface, while a lone man stood at the end of a pier. The only tones were a range of blues.

“Just…call him that, okay?” Hux pressed the issue as he leaned against the table, trying to get closer to see the man’s face.

The inner door opened and in came Mrs Tico, bearing a tray. Turning, he straightened his shoulders as she looked at him with bright eyes. She wanted to touch him. He didn’t want her near him.

“Ben, we prayed for you. Everyday. Now, you’re here! I…I talked to your mother. Everything okay?” She hadn’t aged in the seven years since he’d last seen her. She still looked the same, no lines on her face to distract him. But then he remembered the summer holidays that Paige always complained about when they were younger. Her mother preferred colder vacation spots, without the heat of the sun. There was always water, but no sun.

“Thanks, yeah,” he huffed out, biting back the rest. She set the tray on the table and he backed away from her when she came closer.

She looked him up and down, from his misfitting jeans to his white T-shirt. Her gaze riled up a knot of discomfort in his stomach. The others were still chatting, but he knew that they were still listening. She smiled lightly at him when he awkwardly extended his hand. Grinning, she shook it. When she finally left, he closed his eyes and let his shoulders slouch.

Paige waited until the door to the upstairs snapped shut and then grinned. “So. A game!”

She grabbed some card game from the pile stacked on a bookcase in the corner and he waited until she sat down at her former spot before he placed himself between her and Hux. The others shifted off of the sofa, putting their elbows on the coffee table. Liza’s eyes were still intently focused on him. They passed out the cards and he shook his head, intent on just watching. It seemed like an easy game, but he just wanted to sit and listen, trying to gauge if the game was worth learning. The others seemed to accept his silence as they laughed and joked through the first round. He smiled lightly when Hux won. It might be worth playing, but he still declined as Hux started dealing the next round.

There was instant panic when Paige got up after her turn; but she was back in less than a minute, placing a bowl of chips between them.

As the others were looking at their hands, Kel’s voice cautiously asked, “Was the guy that took you really crazy?”

The game paused in an instant and he heard Hux sigh, setting his cards down firmly on the table.

“We’re not going to talk about that.” He felt Hux shifting closer to him as he spoke.

He just stared blankly at Kel. “He was insane.”

“I heard that he killed like fifty kids,” Elia added.

Shrugging, he looked at his hands. “Something like that. I don’t know.”

“People are making videos about you. Like, tons of people online,” Doph said. “If you made a channel you’d get so many…”

“I haven’t looked up anything about it. I just talk to the FBI and the cops. They tell me some stuff.” He wanted to lift his head, but he was waiting until his hands stopped shaking.

Paige finally knocked on the coffee table. “No more talking about it. We promise, Ben. We’ll listen to whatever you want to talk about but we won’t ask about it.”

Kylo looked up and saw everyone nodding. Managing to quirk his lips in response, he nodded.

So they kept playing and he kept sipping on his coke.

Paige won and she grinned brightly, shifting to sit at the end of the table to deal out the next round. Everyone looked relaxed and comfortable but he could only feel the urge to be alert press on his mind.

There was no one between him and Liza now. She had kept looking at him, not saying anything. She’d laugh with the others and kept picking up and setting down cards, but all he could feel was her pale blue eyes on him. She kept inching closer to him and he kept trying to make more space between them. Stretching out, she rested her hands at her sides, close enough to almost touch him. Her intense eyes and curious hand had made him want to leave long ago.

And no one noticed.

He had learned for so long how to observe everything and everyone around him. The others were either eating, drinking, or chatting, all while playing a game that he thought was easy, yet didn’t want to play.

The only reaction he caught was Hux glancing at him. At least he had one person in the room that would let him react if he needed to.

“Where’s the washroom?” He asked, looking directly at Paige.

“Oh,” she sat up and smirked. “It’s across from the stairs, the next door after the guest bedroom. It smells like feet in there. Dad won’t let mom put anything in there to make it better.”

Kylo let his face settle into what he thought was a neutral expression but he still saw Paige smile brightly at the response. That was usually the reaction he expected from the nurses when he expressed an emotion. He was always trying to put himself in other people’s thoughts, to find their way of thinking. Most people smiled when they were nervous. He was making his friends nervous by not sharing more. But Liza was smiling for another reason.

He easily found the washroom and shut the door. He went there more to escape the itch that Liza’s presence was sending across his body. Sliding down against the wall, he stared at the simple cupboard below the sink in the softly toned room. It was a typical washroom for a basement of a house built in probably the 1970s. He remembered how their basement looked before they renovated it a few years before he was taken. It was small, with a glassed-in shower in the corner. Fake flowers sat in a silver vase on the edge of the sink, beside a bar of pale green soap. The handle on the door to the cupboard was shiny. He reached out and frowned — it wasn’t metal but plastic, but it looked gold. It was still fake and not real. He tapped his nail against the material and his frown deepened.

The lightbulb in the ancient glass light fixture flickered and he jolted.

Darkness had come in a flash, but it still made his body go rigid.

There were voices in the next room but they bled off into silence. A ringing settled into his ears as the nothingness bled off. His chest felt tight and he reached up and locked the door. Colours faded off in the small washroom, replaced by a murky haze. He blinked hard, trying to clear his eyes. The sounds behind the door became clearer. He heard the young voices talking and then suddenly stopped again. The screams started from a low rumble to a thundering and endless tempo and he cupped his hands over his ears. Pulling his knees closer to his body, he shuddered. He was killing them. They were all suffering the vicious punishment of a man without feeling. The walls blurred again, darkening. He’d helped that man. He’d willingly killed in order to survive. He had to, for Rey. She never got to be innocent in that space.

Frustrated, he pulled his hands away. The floor felt gritty and dirty, rough against his hands. He could feel the pieces of rotten wood mixed with the cold earth.

The room swayed, replaced by the corner of the basement, Snoke’s basement. His eyes couldn’t focus at the sight of the darkened, hateful place.

Gritting his teeth, he let his head sag against the wall. His breathing became ragged, trapped in his chest. He was trapped there. The deep stench of death burned his nose; nothing was clean and everything was tainted. The walls were rotten and water stained. The mould was sour against the wall. The scents filled his nose and the surroundings were blurred yet familiar. The tears in his eyes distorted everything. It was all real. The reality was more vivid, pressing on his mind.

He rolled into a wave of despair, knowing that he hadn’t escaped. He was there. The ground was real. The smells were real. He was still under Snoke’s power. Tears stung his eyes and he dropped his head.

None of it had been real. He had hurt and killed Rey. He’d imagined it all. The cops, the hospital, Agent Jinn, and coming home. He’d dreamt it all, out of some insane part of his mind. Whimpering, he looked out into the darkness as the tears warmed his cheeks as he choked back a tortured sob.

A whisper of a glimmer caught his eye. It was a faint golden tone, shining in the distance of his basement hell.

With an unsteady hand, he reached out.

And he felt the hard, fake plastic of the cupboard fixture.

Blinking hard, he focused on his grip. The visage faded, piece by piece, into the serene lite blue of the Tico’s guest bathroom.

None of it had been real. He angrily stood and turned on the water, viciously splashing his face. He had believed his own twisted mind and had been drawn back into the darkness. He had to be stronger than this. He had to stop being so afraid of everything.

Turning off the water, he met his own eyes in the mirror. His reflection told him he was there, but he didn’t believe it. He turned away instantly, angry at the sadness that shone in his brown eyes.

When he opened the door, his heart dropped again. Liza was leaning against the wall and gave him a small smile when his feet finally agreed with his mind and he stepped out of the room.

“I don’t think it matters what everyone says. You were really brave to save that girl.” Liza smiled lightly at him, her hand twirling a strand of her blonde hair. “Wait, are you okay?”

He felt his cheeks warm, knowing that his eyes still bore the evidence of tears. He shook his head and Liza stepped closer. She pulled him into an awkward hug. His body still tense, he couldn’t resist her. When she stepped away he shook his head again.

“Her name is Rey.” His reply was wooden. He could still hear the others laughing and talking around the corner. They were alone there, in the shadowed hallway.

“I, um, really missed you,” Liza said, taking another step closer to him. “I’m glad you came tonight. Maybe we can talk more another time. I'm going away to camp but we have the summer, right?”

He was frozen where he stood, anxiety and terror still lingering in his veins from what he saw in the washroom. He felt Liza touch his hand and he just stared at her.

“We were never really friends.” His voice was flat, just wanting her to move away. “You didn’t invite me to your birthday party.”

Liza frowned and then her mouth shifted to a quick smile. The problem was being worked out in her head. He finally heard her laugh lightly as the memory clicked. “I was six. My parents picked who could come. I wanted you there. Just believe me. I wanted to invite the whole class but mom wouldn’t let me.”

He didn’t trust her. He wanted to move away but she stepped closer.

“You’re my hero, Ben. You were so brave. You’re so famous now and it’s because of something awful, but you’re just…I like you. I wanted to come tonight to talk to you and get to know you.” Her voice had the air of fake kindness that cut into him instantly. This was the tone that nurses, doctors, and therapists took when they were trying to pull him out of a spiral. They were idiots, and so was Liza. They tried to treat him like a child, tricking him into how he should feel. He was in control and needed to be. They couldn’t take that from him.

Liza’s hand felt like the dirt of Snoke’s death chamber and he couldn’t move. She squeezed his hand and his thoughts were empty. Her lips were shiny, covered in a glossy pink shimmer.

She stepped closer and tilted her head. “I’m really sorry about the birthday thing. Maybe I can make it up to you?”

She shifted on her feet, bringing their mouths in line, and kissed him.

The world greyed out; her lips met his in only a whisper, but the pressure was enough to wake him up. He was finally broken from his fear. With two firm arms, he struck out and shoved her away, knocking her hard against the wall. He couldn’t hear anything. He was moving before he could find the trail of a thought in his head. His mind could only latch onto the clearest exit and he took the stairs in three strides, ignoring the blurred faces that he caught in his peripheral vision.

When he’d finally escaped into the night air, Kylo was instantly set on going home. He screamed, letting out every feeling from the violation. He didn’t care about the uncomfortable jacket that he’d left on the floor of Paige’s basement because this was all her fault. He screamed again, letting the betrayal settle into his perception. No one had told him that _she_ would be there. He didn’t want Liza anywhere near him. He didn’t want her to touch him. And now, he was left feeling like he wanted to crawl all the way home to feel something other than the painful itch that she had sent down his body.

Hux was right behind him and he turned to his friend and exhaled angrily. He didn’t know how long he had been standing there.

“You didn’t say anything about that!” He snapped as he took two long strides from the house. Hux followed, stuttering out an apology, while also asking what had happened.

He was halfway down the driveway when he heard two other pairs of feet. He turned with furious eyes to see Paige with Liza not that far behind her.

“Ben, I’m sorry, don’t go, I…” Liza started, but he silenced her with a glare. She slowly turned and went back inside, her feet dragging in the gravel. Paige’s shoulders were low when he looked at her again.

“I…I’m sorry. It’s not your fault,” he managed to say to her. It was a lie, but her face was so sad. But she still didn’t respect him. Her feelings weighed him down and he would have to force them out of his mind on the walk home.

“I don’t know what just happened, but if she was dumb, then it is my fault.” Paige shrugged and looked around. “If you need a ride home…”

“We’re fine.”

She had his jacket in her hand. Hux took it so he didn’t have to go back.

He wanted to get that girl and what she had done to him out of his mind.

Storming to the end of the way, Hux finally slowed and handed him the coat. Kylo had felt cold the second he’d left the house, but now he was almost freezing. He tried to smile at his friend but realized it fell flat by the look he got in return.

“You should go back,” he said. “I’m sorry I…fucked everything up.”

“What happened? All we heard was…”

He levelled a harsh glare at his friend. “She kissed me. She didn’t even ask if it was something that I wanted.”

Hux’s eyes widened and then he tucked his hands in his pockets. “She’s been talking about you a lot.”

“Why didn’t you tell me she’d be here? I never liked her.”

“I thought that…” Hux trailed off. “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”

He started walking and heard Hux struggle to keep up with him.

Hux tilted his head and then frowned when he finally caught up to him. “No. No. If you didn’t want her to kiss you then…yeah…no, we needed to leave. Come on. Let’s go home. Fuck them.”

He took long and angry strides towards his house and only had to stop when he saw the news vans looming in the distance. Groaning, he stomped his foot, grinding against the pebbles that littered the pavement. Hux had stopped a few steps behind him and sucked in a breath through his nose. He gestured towards the alley and Kylo followed.

“It’s not that I didn’t want her to kiss me,” Kylo lied as they walked down the empty, yet well-lit, alleyway. “I just…don’t like…anyone touching me. Unless I want them to.”

“It’s okay,” Hux said, quickly. “Liza was just too much. She’s missed you. We all missed you.”

“I didn’t miss her. She doesn’t know anything about what we went through.” The visions from the washroom still shook in the corners of his mind as he spoke. The floor had felt real, the smells had been real. It grated on his mind, still twisting despite the freshness of the night air. “She doesn’t know anything about pain. She doesn’t know _anything_ about what it’s like to watch your friends die and then have to stuff them into barrels because if you don’t then _you might die!_ ” He had started talking and didn’t realize that he was shouting at the end. They were behind Hux’s house and Kylo couldn’t look at him anymore. Turning away, he lifted his head up at the sky. The stars were clear and bright, shining down in the vision of freedom that he’d always pictured but no longer believed could be true.

Hux took two careful steps around him, taking deep breaths. “I’m…I’m sorry. You can talk to me about this. They don’t have to know.”

“You don’t want to know,” he said, then sighed. “This will never get better. I’m…I don’t know what to do anymore.”

Frowning, Hux looked at his feet and then up at the sky. “Could you see the sky in California? The stars? I’ve never been there.”

Lifting his head again, Kylo took in the clear night’s sky. The stars swept out from the horizon, filling a field of black with glittering pinpricks of distant light. Dropping his hands, he bit his lip to hold back his tears. He knew that most of those stars were long dead; they were gone, burnt out long ago. His father would show him the stars when he was much younger, explaining to him plainly how the universe worked. There was no forever. Everything died. There was either an explosion, killing everything in a spectacle or a descent into blackness that enveloped everything into the throws of death, or a dull whimper that still destroyed everything. It all meant death and destruction, without the promise of a forever. Maybe Snoke was right to try to live forever from the blood of young people. Being so close to death would make him unafraid of dying.

Clutching at his wrist, he dug his nails into his skin as the spike of anger arched through him. Liza and her twisting hand and sickly sweet lip gloss was pushed from his mind as he took in the silent alley and the sky above him. He wiped at his mouth again and let his eyes go unfocused on the glitter left on his sleeve.

“No,” he finally said. “We weren’t allowed to go outside.”

Hux, fumbling with his words, opened and closed his mouth quickly. He shut his eyes, pressing them tightly together. Frowning deeply, he shook his head and then stamped his foot in the dirt. The next words sent up a jolt of electricity into the still night air. “I just don’t know what you want! Everyone at school thinks that Liza is hot and you…you just push her away and I…if she did that to me I…what’s wrong with you?!”

The shout went out into the sky. Kylo just blinked in response.

He couldn’t find words. Instead he just scratched at his wrists.

Hux turned away and let out a frustrated exhale, running his hand over his face. Their steps on the gravel, tracing small and separate circles, kept the night from being completely silent. Hux turned to face him and he could see the frustrated tears in his eyes. Kylo drew his feet together and straightened his shoulders, ready for a fight. He’d seen Snoke’s tears before. He knew that they could be a trick or a trap, to try to get him to comply and then stab him in the leg, crippling him for a month.

Instead, Hux just dropped to the ground, his face hitting his jacket as he wrapped his hands around his knees.

Frozen, Kylo looked first to the stars and then to his friend.

“Do you not want to be my friend anymore?” His voice was small and low, but he forced the question out of his stubborn mouth.

Hux looked up, narrowed his eyes, and then wiped at his face. “No, that’s…that’s not the point. I don’t want to leave you alone. I really don’t. But maybe if I went back then they…”

“Wouldn’t hate me?”

A light smirk crossed Hux’s face. He shook his head and then smoothed his hair. “Yeah, that. And I really like Paige and she doesn’t like me…”

“She will,” he gulped out. He could only picture Hux on Snoke’s basement floor, begging to live, as a knife is held to his throat. His tears wouldn’t be from some teenage angst. They would be from real terror. “She likes you.”

Hux just shrugged. “No one likes me.”

Kylo let his arms drop. He wanted Hux to go back and have fun. He had fallen easily into the game and conversation. And he had ruined it all by reacting like he did. He wanted him to keep going with his life and forget that he was dropped back onto the planet. But he also didn’t want to lose him.

“Go back, they’ll still be there. I’ll…text you when I’m inside and with Rey.” He wanted to reach out to his friend but his hand fell away when he took a step closer. He chewed on the inside of his cheek, needing the intimate distraction of pain.

“You don’t need a fucking babysitter.” Hux forced out a laugh. “Just don’t…I’m scared for you all the time. It’s better than not knowing where you are or what’s happening to you, way better. But now, I feel worried about how you’re doing when we don’t talk. You’re either sad or angry and I want to make you feel better. But I can’t figure out how. I really didn’t mean to yell. It was dumb. I just don’t want you to leave again.”

Kylo quirked his head. He wanted to leave, yes, but he couldn’t. Not for a few, long years. Maybe when he could drive, he’d make a plan. He studied his friend and tried to weed through the words to understand exactly what he meant. Hux had other friends. It didn’t make sense that he’d be so concerned about someone who he hadn’t seen for seven years. Still, like with Rey, he wanted to find words to comfort him. But, unlike Rey, Hux wouldn’t know that he would be lying. “For the first time in a long time, I’m safe and okay. Go and tell…our friends…that it’s fine.”

Pushing himself off the ground, Hux looked up at him. He wiped at his eyes and ran another hand through his hair. He fidgeted in place before finally nodding. “Just text me, okay?”

After jerking his head, Kylo watched his friend dust off his pants and give him one last look before turning and jogging down the alleyway. He heard the brief stop in the tempo before he turned and disappeared, leaving the alleyway.

Finally alone, he looked up at the sky again.

Like a meteor crashing to Earth, he’d pulled everyone into the crater that was him. He dully looked at his house and let out a breath and crept painfully from his throat.

He could run away now. He could save everyone from the continued pain of his existence. In the dark, alone, he could cry. He entered the back gate to his house and waited until it snapped shut before he let out a choked gasp. Crying openly was one thing, but wanting to carve up the backyard with his eyes was another. Stumbling to sit beside the detached garage, he looked at the dimly lit kitchen window.

This place was home.

It was always supposed to be home.

But his heart told him something else.

Hux’s words stung. But they weren’t anything that he hadn’t thought about before. His anger and his fear were warranted. He wanted to let Hux in on his thoughts but a tight, invisible band kept it from spilling out of his chest and through his mouth. He had to protect him too.

If the river were closer, he would have thrown himself into it.

Instead, he walked up to the back door of his house and unlocked it. He slipped inside and quickly relatched the door. His eyes wouldn’t stop leaking so he rubbed at them, hoping whoever he met up the stairs would just think it was allergies.

He had been inside for seven years, after all.

When he finally dared to climb the steps up to the kitchen, his frown deepened when he saw his father there, still reading the same newspaper from that morning.

“You weren’t out as late as I thought,” Han said, setting the paper down. “Have fun?”

He shifted his weight and shrugged. He was hungry and thirsty. His eyes locked on the fridge before he pursed his lips. Stiffly, he sat at the table, toying with the frayed edges of an olive-coloured placemat.

He could feel his father’s eyes on him as he tried to keep his focus on anything but the fridge. Finally, but slowly, Han stood. He took the few short steps to the refrigerator and cleared his throat, getting his attention. He opened up the doors, letting a low light into the darkened kitchen.

“You know I hate how your mom buys too much. There’s juice in here. You want it?”

Kylo kept looking forward, still trying to work through his numbness. He wouldn’t be able to sleep if words and feelings kept haunting him.

His father held up the juice bottle. Glancing up, he absently nodded.

“You can take any of this, son. Here and the pantry. We told Rey that tonight and she looked at us like we were freaks.” Han rounded the expanse of the kitchen and opened the cupboard. He put a glass of apple juice near him and he drank it down quickly, trying to escape the conversation. It didn’t work. Instead, his glass was refilled.

“We had…we never got real food.” He was still thinking about Armitage’s words in the alley and kept mumbling. “What am I supposed to do?”

He could hear his father breathe as he sat down. The scratching sound of him straightening his shirt made him lift his head. He had stubbornly hoped that if he didn’t look, he wouldn’t have to deal with wherever this conversation was going. Lowly and briefly, he met his father’s eyes before both looked away.

“We are going to figure it out. Just…remember that none of this is your fault. And I know you hate doctors. I hate them too. Remember when I broke my foot? Yeah. I know that you don’t think that we’re trying, but we are. I lost you for seven years. I can wait until you’re ready to find who you are now. But I’ll still love you, kid. Hell, let me know when you want to take a drive. Your mother would hate it and I’d love it,” his father said, his voice breaking.

He lifted his dark eyes from his focus on the empty glass on the table to the older man. “I…”

Dozens of thoughts pressed on him. He wanted to tell his father about Liza, about Hux, about everything. How he didn’t trust the doctors. How he didn’t believe the medicine was working so that’s why he stopped taking it. And how he really wanted to go for a drive, just the two of them. But his tongue felt heavy, flashing back to the dusty parking lot from seven years ago. The confessions died and he could only end his thought with a nod. Escaping the kitchen, he fled to his room.

Lumpy lifted his head as he shut the door. Frustrated, he opened it just a bit so the dog could leave. Rey stirred and sat up at the noise. A colouring book rested on her lap and a red crayon. She didn’t have that when he left her. He smiled as he looked at her, still drawn into how round and full her face was. She was normal. He had helped her be normal.

Still full of sleep, she handed him the paper. It was filled with a red swirl, harder and harder with every circle.

“What’s this?”

Rey shifted, finding another spot to sleep. “My brain is…that.”

Sucking in his reaction, Kylo put the paper on his desk, shifting his weight as he stood at the edge of the bed. Rey was looking at him with tired eyes; they kept drifting shut as she looked at him, still willing herself to be awake as he looked at her. “We can draw other things tomorrow.”

Rey mumbled something and then fell asleep. He took in the delicate way that she slept and let the evening’s disappointment wash away. He’d always have this to come home to, no matter what happened.

He let the moment pass and took a long look at Rey before pulling off his t-shirt and pants. He wanted to put on pyjamas but his body was empty, both too hot and too cold to even think about putting on extra clothing. He crawled into bed in his boxers and Rey snuggled against him, her breath warm against his chest as she woke up for a brief moment.

The tranquility of her soft body against him was quickly shattered. His phone buzzed, annoying him from the floor, still trapped in his pants. Grunting, he carefully set Rey down on the mattress and shifting to snag the device from his pocket. The screen sprang to life and he narrowed his eyes at the message.

_I’m so sorry about tonite. I didn’t mean to make you leave._

He didn’t know the number, but guessed that it was Liza, feebly trying to apologize. Wanting to hate her, he glared at the words. She had no right to say that she cared about him. He ignored it and sent Hux a short text instead, telling him that he was home and fine — and that whomever just texted him should stop.

The short response that followed was positive, assuring him that it wouldn’t happen again.

Sitting on the bed, his phone in his hand, he sighed. Every day was exhausting. He couldn’t even close his eyes without being drawn into darkness. Turning to set his phone on the nightstand, he saw the notebook he’d received from Agent Jinn. Reminded of Rey’s drawing, he shrugged to himself. If he could sketch something more positive, he could show her in the morning how to get her thoughts out. That was more important than the constant turmoil that pressed on his mind.

Opening the book, he frowned when a business card tumbled out. The heaviness of the entire week was lifted when he spotted the name as he studied the small white square. Flipping the card, he felt his hand shake. In a few neat strokes, Agent Jinn had written his number and a short note to him.

_Whatever you need, I’ll always answer /QGJ._

This would have to be enough. He had to show Rey how to grow up, but he’d need help from someone who understood.

He had to get better for her. He had to stop the intrusive memories and even more oppressive friends. That was what mattered most.

She was going to be normal. No matter how he felt, she was the future that he had to leave behind. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for delaying this update - I know that it's long and I thought about splitting this into two chapters BUT as the end of this 'act', I thought that it was okay to make it a little bit longer and introduce some new characters. The next chapter will be after a time jump of two years (about). The semester will be starting soon but my goal is to update all of my WIPs before hell begins but that is a lofty goal with so much teaching ahead of me (as well as how generally crappy I feel nowadays - seriously, compared to last summer I have no energy. Don't get old, kids.) I always love feedback and it really keeps me writing so feel free to leave a comment! And if you're about to start another semester at uni, just know that there are instructors out there slowly pushing out fanfic too.


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A middle act of thoughts and feelings from the first year and a half of being in the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have the next act (hopefully not more than five chapters, but we'll see) planned out and mostly written. But the semester is starting next week so posting will be gradual. The next 'act' will also include Rey's perspective, but will still mostly focus on Kylo since this really is his story. Thanks so much for all of the kudos and comments! I'm worried about a crucial aspect of the next act - I guess you'll see when I update the tags... Peace and love!

 

Time was sometimes that Kylo felt in hours or days. But it could also pull him along through weeks or months. He would spend an afternoon helping Rey learn to read and time would finally stop when she would put the right sounds and syllables together. There could be slowness in those moments of shared smiles and the hint of change towards something brighter.

He was being dragged along by time but Rey lived in every moment, even the ones that were spent in tears after a nightmare or in frustration and not knowing a word or idea. But her friends, Paige’s sister among them, didn’t care and taught her made-up words. His jaw ached from how hard he had held his mouth shut to give her those silly little moments.

Hours, days, weeks.

The first summer crawled by, peppered with different forms of touches and space: his father, resting his hand on his shoulder, when they’d practice driving; his mother, wiping something off of his cheek without seeing the alarm in his eyes. When the calendar told them it was time to make the journey to meet with Maz, he refused to go. It took three days of talking to Agent Jinn to convince him that it was the right thing to do, for Rey. She could never feel afraid of talking to anyone. And she missed Maz. He could see the confusion turning into clumsy resolve as his stubbornness starting sewing seeds, which he couldn’t let sprout.

It would have to be enough.

Time both moved faster and slower with everything finally being married to that fucking calendar.

But there were a few things he could do to stop being carried along the stream. He wouldn’t back down from being in the correct grade for his age. Snoke wouldn’t take that from him. Studying meant pushing down his impulsiveness and rediscovering the patience that Snoke’s hell had taught him. He would lock himself in his closet, daring his body to feel panic. It was easy to slip into the state that made him focus on details and remembering. How to learn patterns and how they fit in places. Hux’s notes were useless and he had almost said that to him out of anger at how his friend couldn’t see that himself.

Punishing himself, he was good at that too.

So he studied. He hated using the computer at first, but made himself to get used to the white screen and fragile keyboard. His hands worked best filling up notebooks with a real pen. He’d sketch or write with Rey and then scribble black ink onto pure pages until his looping handwriting sealed his ideas into permanence.

He’d write letters to Agent Jinn, telling him what he was learning and asking him what he should focus on for the future. Texting and calling were almost too temporary. Sending and receiving letters sent pieces of himself across the country.

And then school started.

The reporters were gone and he could leave the front door of his house.

And then it was Halloween, then Thanksgiving and Christmas.

And he got to celebrate all of them, despite having been in constant fights and arguments at school. But he kept studying and trying to ignore anyone who called him a murderer.

They weren’t lying.

He’d float in a bubble as time blew him along, sending him drifting at times into nothing.

Their birthdays were in the spring. He knew that his parents had Rey’s real information somewhere in the house, but they thought it was best if they celebrated on the same day.

They were so lazy.

Rey’s preschool friends filled the house. He and Hux snuck a beer in the backyard and both decided that they didn’t like it. Kylo had let his friend do something he thought was rebellious, even though his parents knew what they were doing. Any punishments were cautious and explained to them with words rather than actions. He had smiled at Hux and accepted a gift of a new wallet as the children screamed and played in the background. His head had been on the other side of those sounds when they walked to Paige’s. He'd sat with the others until he couldn’t see the reality of the basement anymore. 

Liza gave him a notebook and he threw it away when he got home.

Memories were both solid in their tastes, smells and touches, but also empty of real feelings.

The teasing had faded away into background noise. His body didn’t ache anymore and he would have to find other ways to feel pain.

He missed it.

On the first anniversary of their escape, he spent three hours on the phone with Agent Jinn, a rope around his neck in the woods, far away from his family and Rey. He wept and wanted to chase the darkness and let it carry him instead of time.

If he hadn’t cared so much about Rey and her future, he would already been bones. No one believed him when he told everyone that he was already dead, but just hadn’t died yet.

He didn’t say anything about it when he came home.

And then everything started again.

Hours, days, and weeks.

In late July, he had to tell Rey why she should be sad when his grandfather died. Bail’s cancer had come hard and fast, or at least that’s what his mother had said. It was the first time that they saw a dead body in a casket. Rey’s eyes were wide and only cried when Leia did. She didn’t know how to be sad about this, even though they were the two people in the church that knew what sadness really was. It wasn’t a sudden or temporary feeling. It was a lingering fog that was always there, but only appeared to others when the warmth descended into cold. They only saw it when it was tangible to them, when they decided to feel it.

But they knew it was always there, waiting for them.

The book about them, by some useless journalist, came out the week after.

And the week before school started, after a month of unanswered texts and cancelled or abrupt and awkward encounters, Hux said he didn’t want to be his friend anymore and went to live with his dad.

Time punished him more than Snoke ever could.

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> About to turn sixteen, Kylo finds solutions to his high school suffering. See the tags for warnings.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> spoiler: i know nothing about american high school wrestling.

 

The thrill of winning a match made Kylo’s blood hum as the referee raised his hand. It wasn’t exactly getting the deciding point that made satisfaction spread across his chest. It meant that someone other than him had lost. He’d feel dejected and angry with himself for losing so easily. The smell of sweat and the wrestling mat blossomed from his skin as the sound from the gym finally returned to his ears. The other boy looked down at the mat and bit his lip before finally looking at him again. He wanted sympathy. Kylo knew that he looked irritated because the other boy just winced and looked away. To him, his look was empty. The victory was over and he just wanted to disappear from the ring.

Rey hated when he did things like this, how he looked at that boy. She had tagged along to one meet with his parents and wouldn’t let him escape or give excuses. She was almost six and her world wasn’t just him anymore. One of the few times he actually opened his mind more than a crack to Maz was when he realized that Rey had more friends than he did. Her days were for school and friends, but the evenings were for their time together to find any tendrils of Snoke and try to quiet them.

Well, he’d help her.

He had other ways to focus his pain. Wrestling was one of them. Another was knowing that someone else, someone who had failed, had to feel the coldness of his eyes.

He’d be feeling bad the rest of the night. Right now, it was that boy’s turn.

It was the third meet of the spring season. February was cold and dark, but next month meant his birthday and finally being able to drive on his own. Han would let him drive to practice, but would always be in the car with him. Road trips meant being away from Rey, but also time to be alone.

The team hated him. And Coach Canady had stopped trying to prevent most of the cruelty. The pranks that didn’t cause real harm were the ones that actually hurt the most. That he would talk to Rey or Paige about. When he was really low, he’d talk to Liza. She’d change the subject after only a few words, telling him that she’d talk to them for him, and he’d go back to ignoring her.

Kylo had decided that there was nothing but pain in the world and not enough people knew how to deal with it. After his grandfather died and Hux decided to turn his back on him, he saw sadness on one side and hate on the other. His mother would have tears in her eyes because of a song or a picture, while Hux’s mother would sit on her porch with her arms folded. Pain could sometimes be useful and they didn’t realize it. He’d tell Rey that he didn’t like hurting others, but he knew he did. It was a real feeling that he tried to resist. Still, it was there, tempting him. Snoke’s words wouldn’t fully escape him. Hurting others meant that they actually felt something and they were real. It was like the pain felt by the mothers in his life.

His teammates still teased him, but only to a point now. If it weren’t for their pride, he probably wouldn’t even be on the team any longer. If living with a murderer for seven years had taught him anything, it was how to hurt without leaving a mark when he wanted to.

The cheer from his side was more for someone from their school moving forward in the tournament rather than anything he had done personally.

“Good work,” Canady said as Kylo moved to sit with the others. Everyone else but him was showered and had lost long ago. Good, he smirked to himself, spitting his mouth guard into his hand.

He’d wanted to text Agent Jinn. He wanted to tell someone that he was in the quarterfinals tomorrow for his weight class. A brief spike of embarrassment reminded him that he had barely made weight. The smell of the cafeteria turned his stomach everyday. He’d sit with Paige and Liza after they got their food, chewing on a sandwich only because he had to.

He also ate it because Rey made it.

She loved food and the kitchen. He’d force himself to stand there and help her, hiding his rigid movements with clumsiness. Every Sunday was spent making muffins or brownies, or figuring out what they wanted for dinner that week. They’d watch videos on his phone and he’d do the hard things. He ate because he was hungry and it was easier to deal with that sensation when it was Rey doing all of the steps.

He still tossed his pill every morning, until it just wasn’t there anymore.

He couldn’t hide anything.

And his parents wanted someone else to deal with it at the next therapy session.

Watching the next weight class, he swept his hair back and followed the hands and quick movements. The jerking turns and agile hands made teenage boys look less awkward, not like the group that sat next to him. Next year, if he could finally eat normally, he’d be in that group. He was tall enough. Just not bulky enough.

“Oh, he’s good. Look at that. Kylo, how do you do that? That one move, you know, that one?” Poe Dameron slid in next to him and started nattering. Kylo just shut his eyes and ignored him.

Other than helping Rey through the world, wrestling had become his sole passion for the past year other than hating himself. Soccer hadn’t worked out for him. The lingering pain from his broken ankle started to show after half a season. He could run and jump, but being out on the field for so long had always left him limping and swirling with panic that he would always be broken. He had been too slow and had easily been frustrated by not winning and not being where he needed to be. Hux had been disappointed, but they’d signed up for wrestling in the spring. It had been fun—actual fun, not just something that he lied about—and he had quickly and easily put on muscle through training. He loved feeling stronger, filling out his lanky body.

But then everything went to hell when summer ended.

Now, in the afterglow of Christmas break, he was good at two things: wrestling and not having friends.

Most of it was Liza’s fault.

If it weren’t for her, he’d still have Hux.

Despite the shaky start, he’d settled in easily to the routines of listening, learning, and following whatever their teachers said. When he was finally left mostly alone, after the fourth or fifth fight, he was allowed to fade into the background to the other students. He had to graduate. He had to get away. He had managed to pour much of his sadness into studying, then the rest of it went to wrestling. Happiness was meant for Rey. He’d go with his parents and drop off Rey, pretending to be happy with the day, and then let his mood sour on the drive over to the other school. His mother had reluctantly accepted his grim face because he was fifteen and had no control. His father knew just as well what he wanted. They weren’t bad parents. They really weren’t. But he’d tell everyone but Rey that they were. The aftermath of the book about him had pushed him even further into a corner. It wasn’t because he didn’t want to be there; it was more like he wanted to be somewhere else that didn’t exist.

Next month, though, he could do all of these things himself. He’d get his license and could take Rey to school. He could take her to the park. They would be able to go anywhere. At school, he would park in the far corner so he’d know exactly who had fucked with his car.

He couldn’t get into any more fights.

Well, at least not at school.

Straightening, he left the bench for the locker room. He snatched up his bag from the pile of their stuff by the door. There were always piles of things and it still made him suck in a breath. There was too much stuff everywhere. No one knew how to live with nothing. He wanted to be alone, but that wasn’t possible. Another aggravation. He gripped the sweatband on his wrist and decided that he would just change and shower at the hotel. He’d let the sweat burrow under his skin, finding every scar and cut. Then he’d scrub himself until the itch was gone. The rest of team gawked at him as he disappeared. At least they had a reason, thanks to him, to be there the next day. That should mean something. But he was used to it by now.

Since Hux quit, everyone had hated him.

And he deserved it.

Apparently, he was a girlfriend stealer. None of it was true, but he just let the rumours take over. It was almost better than the evil whispers that had swirled before about being a murderer. He’d take a lie over the truth because it changed the tone of the taunts.

Liza wanted to be his girlfriend, but he said no. So, she settled for being his friend. But friend was a loose term that he never used for her around others. She’d lurk by his locker and twirl her hair, or ask to work with him on a project. Hux’s eyes would burn into them across the classroom. Paige had followed, and so did the others when they felt like it. Doph picked his lunch table based on the colour of his shirt. He’d sit with Hux when he was wearing red. If it was blue, he’d be with the girls and Kylo, pretending that nothing had happened.

Hux, who had always felt alone, lashed out at him in silence. His face was set in a permanent frown whenever they passed by one another in the hallway.

Everything seemed to happen in slow blows and hidden whispers.

The locker room was half empty. Boys from other teams were laughing about something in the far corner, half naked and red faced from the shower. He had counted how long it would take him to change and moved to the furthest corner from the others. Every article of clothing would be switched with another and he’d put on decent smelling cologne. The other boys wore things that made him gag. It was more about covering up the smell of not showering for him.

When the distant laughter started again, he changed with practiced efficiency.

He could only look with lingering animosity at the showers as he towelled off his hair. He smelled. He was dirty.

But they couldn’t see him.

Letting the towel rest over his head, he heard the locker room door open and close. Even in an unfamiliar school, he still knew that sound. It never changed. Every door needed to be fixed in some way that adults could never put in proper order. They missed details because they were always tired. He had argued with his teachers about how it really felt to be tired — to be too afraid to eat or sleep for days on end — and they would have to hold back what they really wanted to say. He could win those fights with words.

“You’re the murder kid, aren’t you?” A strange voice asked. Black sneakers and red socks owned the voice and he really didn’t want to learn the face.

He left the towel on his head, glaring into the shadow cast onto his legs.

“Hey, fuck off leave him alone. Wait, didn’t he beat you earlier? Go fuck off.”

Dameron. His voice was grating and made him drop his head. He couldn’t even hear the other boys leave the room.

He’d only been at their school for a full month and Kylo had already decided that he had no other purpose on the planet other than to annoy him.

“Hey, what’s up?”

“Nothing.” His reply was short and finally made him move, standing to toss his things together. “Are we going now?”

“Yeah in like…yeah soon.” Dameron was looking at him with a half grin.

He narrowed his eyes, waiting for the other boy to back away and leave. But he didn’t. “Do you want something?”

“I told coach I could room with you. He didn’t say no.”

Dameron was a year below him, still only fourteen. Or at least he thought that's how old he was. But they had one class together — physics. Kylo still couldn’t wrap his mind around how someone so stupid could be taking such a high-level course. He wouldn’t stop talking, but would still do well on exams and tests. He’d always sit with girls and they seemed to like the constant garbage that came out of his mouth. “Why did you do that.”

“Last time, no one roomed with you. I took one for the team. Hey, you’re our only hope tomorrow. Better than staying with coach.” Poe was studying his shoes, kicking at a ball of tape that was affixed to the floor. It was nearly pressed flat and no one had bothered to pick it up.

They had got there late. Normally things like this would have been solved hours ago and he wouldn’t have been trapped in this conversation. The roads had been bad. They hadn’t been able to stop at the hotel before going straight to the tournament. The change in that routine had put him in the right space to vent his aggression. But this change couldn’t end with him striking a teammate, especially the youngest one.

Finally putting his bag on his shoulder, he shook his head. “What are you doing? No one wants to room with me.”

“Maybe I do.” Dameron shrugged, cockiness in his grin. “See you outside.”

Kylo had to fake his confidence. Around most people, he knew that he fooled them. But this boy, this idiot, he carried himself like he didn’t realize how hard it was for others to be in the world.

Rubbing his eyes, Kylo grunted to himself before punching his bag.

He should be happier about winning.

And now it had been turned to dust by a smirking asshole.

-=-

It kept snowing after dinner.

He adjusted his headphones and let the blur of snow match the pace of the music. Each swipe of the wipers hit a beat and he smiled to himself.

Rey had loved the snow. The first time that it snowed, the three of them and the dog had run outside and he had laughed until his stomach hurt. Hux had flakes in his hair, making his skin look even paler. Lumpy chased Rey, barking into the chill of the air.

The memory made his stomach hurt and he turned up his music.

Hux hated him. When he moved in with his dad, he set their friendship into ashes. He could see dark flakes mix with the white as they drove, knowing that no one saw them but him.

He didn’t even fucking like Liza.

Pulling up to the hotel, he took one last look at Poe in the van before they all piled out, a group of anxious teenage boys. He felt like the only one in control, even though he was still working through the puzzle of why Poe would want to room with him.

Normally, he was alone.

None of this made sense.

The younger boy dogged after him as the keys were dispersed and, of course, they were in the room farthest from the others, closest to coach.

“That’s good, right? It means he likes us.” Poe’s overly positive voice made him grip the keycard tighter.

“Not really,” he mumbled, watching the others easily run from them. They were alone in the lobby and his shoulders sagged for a brief second.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just tired. From the drive. Being roomed next to coach means that we’re losers. Or that the others will probably come and fuck with us. That’s what that means,” Kylo said, finally righting himself. “Why did you want to room with me? You knew this.”

Poe seemed to shrug it off. The curls on his dark head framed his face in a way that his hair never did. “Of course I know that the guys talk shit, but it’s not your fault. And just so you know, I always told them not to do the shit that they did last road trip. That was awful. I still feel bad.”

He looked at the shorter boy blankly. “Just make sure that the door is locked.”

They trailed after the others and caught the look from coach as they entered their room. Kylo just wanted to go to sleep, after he called Rey. She had wanted to be there for this tournament, so close to qualifying for state, but her extra tutoring had kept her from him. She was good in almost everything in school, except for working with others consistently. Teachers always tossed around that word; they bashed it into the ground until he didn’t even think about it anymore. She hated group projects and would either be silent or take over from the others. She’d work too quickly and wanted extra things to do. The last meeting at her school was raging in the back of his mind as he opened the door. He tossed his bag on the first bed and frowned when Poe instantly bounced onto the same bed, jostling his things.

“That’s mine.” His voice was deep and annoyed, too tired to deal with his over-energetic roommate.

“What? You’re going to shower. I just want to test them both.”

He gritted his teeth. “They’re the same.”

The beds looked identical. There was nothing to compare or argue.

“Nah. They’re not.” Poe stretched out his hands, pressing the mattress until it squeaked under his weight. He still didn’t move, but he nodded. “Okay, this one’s yours.”

Normally, he liked showering. It was a place where he could be numb and do what he wanted. But now, he wasn’t alone or with coach, who would just go sit in the bar and give him space. Poe looked like he would be awake for a while, longer than he wanted to be conscious. Reaching for his bag, he snapped his head towards the other boy as he sat up to move closer.

He stepped back, snatching up a smaller bag that was buried in his mess of black clothes. He exhaled at the near contact from the other boy. “Don’t touch my stuff.”

They never really trained that much together. Kylo thrived on the control that practice and tournaments gave him. His body accepted touches there but here, alone, he needed to make himself calm down.

Poe was oblivious.

“Cool. Wouldn’t think about it.” He locked eyes with him and then finally nodded and pushed himself off towards the other bed.

There was always a new problem whenever he left the house.

Poe was trying to turn on the television when Kylo could finally escape to the washroom. The door locking made him finally feel safe and his heart settled. The joy of having his bag and its contents in his hand, the weight same as always, made him find his centre. He wasn’t torn about whether or not he enjoyed hurting others; his mind wasn’t wrapped up about glares from Hux. He wasn’t dwelling on why Rey would sometimes stop talking for a week. There was just the rush of oncoming numbness.

He took off his wristband and he studied his skin. His left wrist was neatly ordered, the thin cuts only something that he could see. Each line was his release. Every small slice meant another day of surviving. During his monthly meetings with Maz, he’d wear his jacket the entire time. His body would be covered and he felt both more adult and secretly revelled in fooling her.

The meetings were becoming easier now that he had his small moments of relief.

He tossed his dirty clothes into a corner and turned on the shower. When it was finally warm enough, he took out his razor and grabbed his soap and shampoo and turned to his routine.

The older cuts were the easiest to widen. Cutting a new and still-forming scar would be painful, but not rewarding. The true goal to pain was waiting until a scar was healed, thick and fat with old tissue.

Snoke had taught him that.

Setting the bottles on the tiled floor, he closed the shower door and sat down. The water was warm and the steam made breathing easier. He traced the scars, counting them. Each one of them meant that this was his own body. Snoke’s scars were embarrassing. These were just secrets.

Finding the right spot, the razor split open the old diagonal cut, setting white skin apart and opening his blood to the air. It had to be a deep cut this time to get to what he wanted. Pressing harder, his hand quivered and he sucked in his breath and drank down the sharp sting when the warm water finally mixed with the beads of blood. With another slice, he turned the beads into the shape that he wanted. This was his reward for winning. His muscles ached and his mind would keep him from sleeping, but he could have this.

Lifting the blade, he cocked his head at the drop of blood that lingered on the edge.

He could never let Rey see the cuts. He’d never do it at home. She couldn’t copy him with this.

He poked at the cut, sad that the brief spike of pain had come and gone so quickly.

The steps for showering kept him from fully mourning the end. He’d catch a hint of blood on the tiles. The stream was a fine shade of pink against his skin. Washing it all away, he settled into the awkward aftermath of cleaning it all up. It never bled for that long, toilet paper sopping up the pathetic scratch until it was more or less dry. It wasn’t a real wound compared to what he’d endured. Flushing the toilet paper he reached for something that wasn’t there.

He realized that he’d forgotten his pyjamas in his bag.

He should have been used to doing everything wrong. Hux hated him because he kept missing things. Liza refused to hate him or leave him alone. Paige would listen, but could only hear so much. He had stopped telling her about why he didn’t want to stay later, after the girls had gone to bed. He would give Rey one last hug, when she was safely tucked into Rose’s bed, and go home alone.

Realizing how long he’d been gone, he met his eyes in the mirror. He wasn’t a coward. He couldn’t delay any longer. He needed to call her so she could go to sleep. She needed him. And he wanted to hear her voice. It would make the embarrassment of leaving the washroom with only the towel around his waist bearable.

Reaching for the door, he caught himself making another mistake. At least his leather bracelet was in this bag. Tightening the clasp, he nodded to himself.

Poe was sitting on the other bed, flipping through channels rapidly. Satisfied that his unwanted roommate was distracted, he dug through his bag and found the pair of black sweat pants that he wore for pyjamas. Dameron had changed too, he saw with a quick glance to make sure he wasn’t looking. But the other boy was only pretending not to look at him when he slid the pants on under the towel.

“There’s this. We can watch this,” Poe said, gesturing at the television. It was some talk show. Kylo didn’t care.

“I need to make a call,” Kylo said, prepared to argue for Poe to leave the room. He was still holding the damp towel and felt a slight jolt when he spotted blood against the bleached white. Turning the cloth in his hands he tossed the thing onto the floor in the corner, determined to forget about it for a while. He’d take care of it later.

Instead, the other boy just nodded. The television was silenced in one click. He grabbed his headphones and phone, gave him a light smirk, and left.

The room was quiet. His breathing was the only sound as it overtook the rhythmic hum of the heater by the window.

Frowning at his phone, he could only shake his head. He rubbed his wrist and felt a headache start to spread across his temples. He’d be sixteen soon. And in two years, eighteen. He would finally be a real adult soon. The fights and sneers of school would be over and him and Rey could have their own place.

Dialling home, he started pacing the room.

His mother answered and he sighed.

“Put Rey on the phone.”

“You could at least say hello.” She almost sounded like she enjoyed annoying him. At least his father had taught him how to drive. His mother just worried about whether his jacket was warm enough or his bed was comfortable. She never saw the real things.

He stopped in the middle of the room, looking out the window. He spotted Poe out in the snow. The flakes had turned from storm to bits of fluff, swirling in the light of the parking lot. And he was out there without a jacket.

Fucking moron.

“Hello. Now put Rey on the phone.”

“How did you do? At least tell me that.” He could hear his mother sitting down. He pressed on his wrist, still feeling the dull sting of the razor’s ghost against his skin.

“Better than everyone else.”

His mother chuckled. “All I needed to know. Here’s our girl.”

“When will you be home?” Rey must have been tired. The tone of her voice was never this whiny unless she was exhausted.

“Tomorrow evening. It’s not that much longer.” He played with the fringe on the edge of the blanket on his bed, wondering when the last time it had been properly cleaned. There was a deep must that clung to the grey threads. “We got here late. And I have a roommate. He won’t shut up.”

“He’s probably just nervous. Make him smile at least once. That’ll make me happy, Kylo. Rose was sick today so I couldn’t do anything.” Rey sighed. “And it’s not the same on the phone. Come home.”

“Tomorrow,” he repeated. “Remember to finish your drawing, okay? I really like this one. And I think I found a new recipe for us to try. I didn’t have much to do in the car but think about you. I’m tired too. And yeah, the phone sucks. But I love you.”

“Love you too.” Rey yawned. He knew that she wanted to say more. The picture was of what she wanted to be when she grew up and she’d just managed to draw him. She hadn’t figured out what she could be to him when she was an adult. “Bye.”

“Bye.”

He hung up and sat on the bed.

He’d have to have a long conversation with her when he got back. They were never anything annoying or too difficult. There was something easy about knowing what she shouldn’t do as she got older, since he was mired in making those mistakes.

He was writing her a letter when Poe came back, grinning and covered in snow.

“It’s actually really nice out there if you want to take a walk or something.” He kicked off his shoes and shook off the snow. Kylo watched him cross the room to rest them by the heater. He put his soaking socks next to them. His sharp eyes caught the holes on the heels.

“No.” He kept writing, focusing on putting words for Rey into form rather than just imbalanced feelings.

“What are you doing?”

His eyes narrowed into the harshest glare that he could manage when he snapped his head up at the other boy.

But instead of intimidation shining back in Poe’s eyes, the other boy just smirked at him.

“You’ll have to do better than that to make me flinch,” he said. “Goodnight, I guess.”

His headphones back on his head, the other boy crawled into bed, leaving him to turn off the main light. Annoyed, he stalked across the room to slam his hand against the light switch.

Returning to his bed, in the darkened room, his writing was forgotten for a moment.

No one new had bothered to try to get close to him. Even the kids who were obsessed with gore or heavy metal music had lost interest in him after a few weeks. Some of them would still say hi to him, especially if they had gone to elementary school together. Everyone knew who he was and thought that they knew what he’d been through.

The damned book had meant that reporters had called and dropped by again. Slamming doors and calling lawyers were about all his parents could do. Agent Jinn had even sounded furious when the book claimed to use FBI sources. Maybe whomever he fired would leave a spot for him to get a job there one day.

But the book described how the other children died, and even though it missed most of the real story and aching details, he was still pushed to the centre with blood on his hands.

The other boys thought that he’d strangle them in their sleep. That’s what they said right to his face.

When he turned on his bedside lamp, he put his notebook aside and took one last look at Poe. He didn’t want to sleep, dreading that some cruel prank would inevitably come. Rolling his eyes at himself, he took quick strides to reach the door again.

It was locked.

He actually had listened to him and put the security lock on without him hearing it.

Tilting his head at the gesture, he felt his lip quiver. If he woke up the next morning and all of his things were still there, he’d decide whether or not to be hopeful about the situation.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone, thanks for reading! The comments on the last chapter kept me going through a rough night. One of my cats is at the animal hospital right now. It's his kidneys (he's only six) so they don't know what exactly is wrong and won't know until tomorrow. 
> 
> To say the least, I'm so afraid we're going to have to put him down. Plus, with my workload for the rest of this week and next week, I'm just going to go 'fuck it' and pull the tigger on the start of the next act even though I haven't really combed out some of the mistakes for this one. A chapter from Rey's POV will be coming when things are less...messed up. Hug your kitties for me because I can't hug mine.


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey tries to figure out how Kylo can have a new friend, and still not forget her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everyone! Thanks for the concern about my poor furbaby. He's still not home. He'll hopefully be home tomorrow. There might be an infection and they're still giving him fluids. We know that it's his kidneys and we'll only have him for a few more years. He's only six so it feels very unfair that he won't get a longer life, especially since he's a rescue cat. Kinda wish that healthcare was free for animals in Sweden too...but INSURE YOUR PETS! 
> 
> Anyway, here's a chapter from Rey's perspective. Love your comments and kudos. *hugs*

 

Rey had been waiting all afternoon for Kylo to get back. She had started waiting in the morning, after waiting all day yesterday. Waiting, waiting, waiting. Staring up at the ceiling of Kylo’s room, she let her eyes blur until she could see spots, and then blinked them away. Lifting her head to check the clock, she frowned. Only five minutes had gone by. At least at night she could sleep. The daytime just meant more time waiting. She'd already taken a nap and that had just made her head thick and confused. Why was time so slow when Kylo was away?

Lying on Kylo’s bed, she returned to what she had been doing before. She lifted her arms above her head and pushed to rotate her shoulders. She tried again to roll her shoulders while holding her arms still. She’d shoved Kylo’s pillows off the bed and had to remind herself to pick them up off the floor before Leia did it for her. She was good at doing chores and cleaning up her messes, Kylo's too. No one had to do it for her. But she could do it for him.

Her shoulder started to hurt and she smirked to herself and pressed a little harder.

Someone softly knocked from the doorway. She sat up to look at Han, his arms folded. “What are you doing, kiddo?”

“I’m doing a thing,” she answered. “It’s something to do.”

“But what is it?”

Han took two steps into the room and stopped. She could see him better, but Han seemed to think that she’d tell Kylo he’d been in his room. Of course she wouldn’t say anything, even though it was Kylo’s room. She wasn’t quite big enough to make the bed herself so she had to ask for Leia’s help. Even then, Leia only did it after Rey told her Kylo wouldn’t be mad about other people being in his space.

It was her space too, so she could have mom and dad there.

But now, dad was looking at her with raised eyebrows. His eyes were always kind and she liked his hugs in the morning. He’d also give her an extra pop-tart, even when she didn’t ask for one. And it would be strawberry. Dad meant jokes and treats and driving too fast until she squealed with laughter. Other kids would have been afraid, but she knew he’d never let anything hurt her. She still had a hard time when she thought about how he let Kylo get taken. He wasn’t mean. He was nice.

He loved them. How could he let that happen? The thought still bothered her, even after so much time had passed since they got home.

“Okay, I’ll show you,” she flopped back down on the mattress and extended her arms. “I’m trying to do a thing, a thing that Snoke did to Anja. He took her arms and pulled them really hard and they popped out of her body.”

She wasn’t looking up, and she couldn’t hear Han sigh, so his reaction remained a mystery to her. There was just silence. “Can I ask why you’re doing that?”

“I need to see how it hurt,” she replied, rolling her shoulders again, looking for the ache from before. “Because if I know how much it hurt, then I’ll make sure someone remembers Anja. How she felt will happen again. She was nice to me. I was really small, but she tried to help Kylo take care of me.”

It was something that she and Kylo had discussed for a while. It wasn’t her idea, but it was her brain’s idea. It had put a dream in her head that she’d one day forget all of the others, that the other kids would be really gone forever. She woke up and started looking for her notebook and pens, telling Kylo that she had to draw them all, to make sure that they wouldn’t disappear from her head. And she had to know how they felt before they died. Kylo looked more sad than usual when he left the bed to get his computer. His head was down and his hands were slow to open the laptop. When he finally looked at her clearly, she knew that he shared the same fear. He had too many new people to remember too. They sat there until morning and he let her look through the pictures and stories about the other children. He showed her the memorial story, where all of the families posted about the children who were no longer there, but were still remembered. It made her feel better. Then he showed her another story. He tried to make the computer go faster, but she still saw her own face; it was blurry and taken from a distance. But it was there. And then she saw what he wanted her to see.

There were still four without names and real pictures. The others had drawings done by the police.

Anja was one of them. Her in real life wasn’t there.

Han slowly sat on the bed. She lifted her head and realized that she probably shouldn’t have been that honest. But she wanted to be. She saw how Kylo walked around without someone to talk to because he didn’t want to explain what he was thinking or why it was in his head. Most Sundays, he’d just sleep until the late afternoon. Every day of Christmas break, he just wanted to stay in bed. She wouldn’t have to pout or do anything to get him up, despite how much she wanted him to be around. He needed to sleep if he was tired but it was so lonely without him. But he’d always get out of bed when she finally asked.

“You know I’m not mad, Rey. You can always tell me these things. And, if you trust me, I think I can tell you why I understand,” he said. “You trust me?”

“’Course.” She smiled. “You’re Kylo’s dad.”

“Technically,” he said, leaning forward to rest his elbow on the bed. “I’m your dad too. I’ve just got a piece of paper that says that though.”

She knew other people, normal people living normal lives in the real world, could get sad and feel pain. She mostly knew because Kylo told her that they did up until she started going to school and she could see it for herself in the other faces that filled her class. It still wasn’t real school yet. The first one was pre-school. The other children were crying and asking for their moms and dads. She walked up to her teacher and asked her whom she should miss if she didn’t have a mom and dad. She just had a Kylo, a Han, and a Leia. And a dog.

Another teacher came and they went and sat in another room. Rey had been thankful for that. They’d been to the school several times before the first day. At first, there had been three other kids there. One was named Rose. She knew Rose because she was Paige’s sister. She waved at her and they sat at a table and coloured for a while and played a game that was too easy for her. Kylo had been allowed to watch but she couldn’t talk to him, although they still _talked._ He mostly just texted Hux or read a book, but he was always there. She felt safe. Then, the next time, there were ten children. Rose was still there, but Kylo wasn’t allowed to be there. She had heard him yelling at her teacher outside of the room and his face was hard when he came to say goodbye. She hated when he wore his mask. He told her that he wasn’t mad; he was just worried about her.

This was before they spent so much time apart.

Kylo would have to go to school. He couldn’t spend all of his time with her.

The third time was when they met all of the other children and their parents the night before school would start. It would only be two days a week, but Kylo would have to go to school everyday.

Rey knew that Kylo hated it more than she did.

And that’s what she told this other teacher on the first day. The woman wasn’t that old. She wasn’t old enough to be a mom. But she didn’t look confused and said to her that she had a mom, a dad, and a brother. Rey remembered frowning and shaking her head. The people at the hospital called Kylo her brother too. But he wasn’t. Not really. Paige was Rose’s sister because they had the same mom and dad. Her mom and dad were dead.

The teacher still didn’t get mad at her when she explained those things. Instead, she nodded.

She said that some families were different. But if Han and Leia loved her, took care of her, and made her feel like their house was her house, she could call them mom and dad. She didn’t have to forget her real parents, because they’d always live in her heart, but she had a new mom and dad who she could love and miss, just like the other kids.

And then Rey went back to the other children and tried to explain to Rose what the teacher had told her. Rose looked at her and tilted her head. _So, why not?_

That night, when she told Kylo about her day, he looked at her with a growing frown. His face would start off neutral and then would fall. _The teacher is right. But it’s your decision. You know why I don’t want to call them mom and dad, but I don’t want that to stop you. You need to love more people, Rey. You can love them if they give you the right reasons to do it. You can’t care about everyone, but some people need to be cared about more than they think they deserve._ Kylo, when he was talking to himself more than to her, would sometimes speak more like an adult than how the others treated her. When he was tired or sad, he’d sometimes treat her like a little kid. Those were only rare flashes on bad days.

If she could be big tomorrow, she would be. It sucked when everyone felt like they had to tell her how things worked and how to feel.

She realized she had been quiet too long when Han reached out to tap her foot. Smiling, she shook her head at the playful touch.

“I know, dad.” She looked at his face and saw the pieces that Kylo got from him. It made her miss him more. “But it’s not just the piece of paper. You’re my dad because I love you.”

She liked saying those words. She liked seeing how happy it made Han. She said it to Leia one time when they were alone, walking Lumpy in the park. Leia had pointed at a place where she used to take Kylo to play. The smile on her face had slowly turned to sorrow until Rey reached for her hand and told her that she loved her.

“And I love you too. So that’s why I understand why you need to do your…remembering. We’ve talked about this, about other things. We want you to be a normal kid, but you’ve got a bunch of horrible stuff in your head that we can’t pull out and erase. I’d do it in a second if I could, but I’m not a miracle worker.” Han reached for her foot again, pinching her big toe so she giggled. “And I’d do it in a fraction of a second for Ben. But that doesn’t mean I love him more.”

“I know. He’s got…he’s got everything. I just have a piece.” Her grin faded. “I wish I had more for him.”

“You’ve said that before. And I still believe you. Even though I’ve told you that it doesn’t work that way. But you know, just keep getting him to talk more. And keep getting him to bring his friends around.” Han said, gently. “You want to take the dog for a walk? Maybe he’ll get here quicker if we do something else than lay around.”

Rey nodded and hopped off the bed. She picked up the pillows and put them back before turning to Han. He was looking around the room and shaking his head. To distract him, she took the few steps towards him to wrap her arms around his legs. His hand rested on her head and she sighed.

There were always more conversations when she spent so much time waiting.

 

-=-

 

Kylo finally got home after dinner. He was mumbling to himself when she ran to the back entrance to peer down at him. He’d always be taller, but she could sometimes look higher than he could. A real smile crossed his face when he looked up at her. He was shaking the snow from his boots. He’d left his jacket on the floor and she smirked at him. Taking the few steps down to the entrance, she picked up the soft black coat. She hugged it a little, making sure it felt better; the jacket was probably sad that it had been tossed down without care. Kylo’s smile faltered and then he nodded and properly hung up the coat beside hers.

“It was snowing. That’s why I’m late,” he said. His cheeks were flushed though. He’d been outside. He probably was pacing outside of Hux’s old house, looking into the window and imagining that he was there. Rey knew because she did it too.

“It’s okay. I helped make dinner. And we took Lumpy to the far away park. He chased a squirrel and I saw the squirrel go up the tree to his house. I don’t think that the squirrel was really scared. There were a lot of other dogs in the park.” She always talked too much after dinner. Mom and dad would let her talk and ask her real questions. They really cared about her story about the squirrel’s house and his family. She could see it all and tried to describe it as well as she could.

Kylo smirked again and hugged her. “I missed you too.”

His plate was on the counter and she stamped her foot a little when he didn’t bother to warm it up or take it to the table. He started eating standing over the counter. There was a hint of annoyance when he looked at her, so it was clear he was tired. She’d helped make the rice and Leia had let her turn over the pieces of chicken in the pan. Plus, she got to choose which vegetable to make.

Waiting for the microwave to beep, Kylo studied his socks. Rey climbed onto her chair and kicked her legs, waiting for him to say what he was thinking about. He’d always focus on something when he was waiting to find certain words.

“I think I made a new friend,” he said. “But I haven’t decided if I want to be his friend.”

“Why wouldn’t you want to be his friend?” Her heart lifted instantly at the word. Kylo didn’t admit he was lonely after Hux moved away. He’d tell her that she was enough. But she still couldn’t talk about things like they could. “Are you being…in your head?”

The microwave beeped. The plate slid out of the microwave with heavy scraping. Kylo sat down and started to move the food around his plate. He only started eating when she started telling him about the steps she took to help make it. She wanted to be good at cooking so when they moved away and left, she’d be a good cook and could take care of him. Maybe if she made the food taste better, he’d want to eat more.

Although wrestling took him away from her, she noticed that he started eating more before going away. He’d eat and check the scale. He’d even have snacks with her. She didn’t think that he liked ice cream until he told her how good mint chocolate chip tasted. She thought it tasted funny, like her mouth was tingling too much, but she decided that it was her favourite too.

“He’s annoying.” Kylo finally spoke after he was done eating. She looked at the plate and decided that it was enough. “He talks too much. It’s hard to think when he’s talking so much. And he wanted to room with me. There’s something wrong with him.”

She was thinking about her answer when Kylo stood. He filled two glasses of water and gave her one. He leaned against the counter again, sipping at his glass.

“Maybe he just wants to be your friend. Like when I met Finn. He was shy and I started talking to him so he wouldn’t be afraid of being new,” she replied, remembering the first day Finn was in class in November. He seemed so worried that no one would like him because he’d just moved there. Rey liked that he was new; he wouldn’t know anything about her and she’d be able to have a new start.

Kylo sighed and nodded. “Poe’s new too. I didn’t really talk with him until yesterday. That was probably mean. But he already has other friends.”

“Maybe he wants more?”

“He would,” Kylo scoffed. He set his glass in the sink and stretched his arms, groaning as he moved. “Where are Han and Leia?”

Rey lifted her shoulders. “Upstairs. They wanted us to talk before you told them about the thing.”

Nodding, Kylo rubbed his eyes. They’d given them space. It seemed like Kylo didn’t like it when his parents showed him kindness or understanding. He turned to her and extended his arm, telling her that it was time for them to go upstairs.

Han and Leia were watching television and reading. She liked their room. It was big and tidy, but had so many things to look at and study. There was love there, for both of them. There were so many bookshelves and pictures. Her favourite was a picture taken on her first Christmas. Kylo looked like he was almost smiling, kneeling beside her by the tree. Her cheeks reddened at the memory of not understanding what was happening and why there were so many people around. Why there was so much food. Why there were presents under a tree for no reason other than it was someone else’s birthday.

Then she ruined it all by telling everyone in school after the break that there was no Santa Claus.

She didn’t like the idea of an outsider, who knew who she was and what she wanted, coming into the house and leaving strange packages for her.

Santa Claus was scary, not friendly. The other kids cried and she had to sit with the other teacher and tell her why she felt that way. It wasn’t like talking to Maz. She knew why Kylo was angry at adults, but it was good to look into the eyes of an adult trying to make her feel a certain way and understand why he walked around in constant suspicion of everyone around them.

But soon he’d be like them. What would happen then? She was still listening to everyone talk, but her brain was giving her the strange thoughts again.

Kylo was standing by the doorway with his arms folded, telling them about how he’d finished third, but at the next meet, he would probably win. He knew what he did wrong and how to fix it in practice in the next weeks. She watched his eyes as he retold the match. They would dart from side to side, remembering what had happened. She liked it when he had those kind of memories, the better ones. He had done the best out of everyone at his school, on his team. He should feel good. But instead, he was just in his head, replaying the events so he would do better the next time.

And Rey knew that he probably wouldn’t—her stomach starting to hurt at the thought—and then he’d be even angrier with himself.

The thought wouldn’t leave her head as they got ready for bed, mixing in with her worries about what was going to happen. Kylo was going to get his license. They had gone to look at cars a few weeks ago and he’d grabbed her hand tightly when he saw one that he liked. This was part of it. This was just going to get bigger. She watched as Kylo tossed his clothes towards the basket and she didn’t want to pick them up. His pyjamas were just black shorts; he had the ones that she’d picked out for him, but he wouldn’t wear the lighter colours. She thought he’d look good in purple. He didn’t, apparently. She still thought about it, even though she promised him that she wouldn’t. He did so much for her; they could disagree.

She brushed her teeth and Kylo sat on the edge of the bathtub, telling her about his biology lesson from last week. He’d figured out the problem and no one else got it. It was something about cells and how they divided, and then what happened. It was something with a word that she didn’t know, but he felt certain about. It sounded important and she tried to listen. But she was more interested in how he moved. He would tell her that he wasn’t bragging, but he was. Rey watched as he made small motions with his hands when he spoke about the rest of his class. He’d flick his fingers when it came to Liza. Then, when he’d talk about Paige, he’d rest his hand on his cheek and lean into his hand.

“What about your new friend?” She asked, spitting into the sink and then lifting her head from the sink to look in the mirror. Perched on the small footstool, she looked over at him.

His hand was still, resting on his bare knees. “What do you mean?”

“Was he there?”

He shook his head. “He’s a grade below me. I only have one class with him.”

She was watching his hands and they slowly clenched together.

“What’s his name?” Rey asked, still trying to work through what Kylo meant with his actions. They were in between a Liza and a Paige story. It was something closer to a Hux reaction. He wanted to be his friend and didn’t know how.

“Poe.” Kylo answered, then stood and folded his arms. “And I know how to be friends with him.”

He left before she could answer, stalking off with his eyes held forward. She had to watch his stiff shoulders exit the small washroom and leave for his room. Her own breathing made her nervous when the room was suddenly quiet. She must have been blinking her thoughts. Her own heartbeat thundered to life in her ears and she bit her lip to remember that she was really there, in the house. She so rarely made him so mad that he would show it. Hopping down from the stool she took the few paces towards his room and stopped.

If Kylo got a new friend, he’d be gone more often.

He’d want to spend time with him and do boy things. It wouldn’t be like with Paige and Rose. They’d play loud video games until they made her head hurt. Television was okay. Computers and the phone she could watch. But only for so long. There were too many pictures and stories to make sense of. It was supposed to be real, but it wasn’t. Kylo had told her about it before, how people liked to watch things that were fake in order to feel emotions that could be real. They knew that everything was written down and filmed or created by someone else to make them have those sensations in their hearts because they still liked feeling a certain way. He made it make sense.

But now, he was making her feel alone. Now, he was pushing her into the dark place.

The dark place was where Snoke could hurt her. There, she was trapped and Kylo couldn’t get to her. The door was locked and she could hear him tapping to her outside of the door. He couldn’t scream and demand to get her out. He could only tell her it would be okay. But now it wasn’t.

Standing in the hallway, she dropped her head, whimpering. She hated crying. It only meant that her feelings were real, but also in another place that was outside of her body. Her feet were touching the cool wood floor. Her eyes could see the white paint on the walls. But her head was stuck with Snoke. And she couldn’t get away.

Kylo’s strong arms came around her, pulling her towards him. “I didn’t mean to leave, love. I’m sorry. I was…I was there too. In my head. I don’t…I’m sorry.”

She hugged him back and nodded.

He picked her up and hugged her closer, holding her until she felt the other real again, not the fake real. She was there, with him. Snoke wasn’t there. He was dead. Mom and dad were still watching television down the hallway. She could hear it. But they weren’t her real mom and dad. She felt Kylo carry her to bed and she didn’t want to let go when he put her down. Maybe if she held on harder, pulled him close enough, then they could fix it. If she thought hard enough about it, she’d have her real mom and dad. If they lived in her heart, she could make them real.

“I want to make them real too,” Kylo said, pulling her into his arms on the bed. “But if we did, they’d take you away from me. And I wouldn’t be okay without you.”

“But you’re not okay.” Her mouth was stringy with spit and she cried. “You’re not supposed to get mad at me. I was just asking a question.”

“I know, I know.” He cradled her closer and she felt her own tears on his skin. “I wasn’t mad at you. I’m never mad at you. Even if I act like it, I’m not.”

Rey nodded and she breathed in against his chest. He smelt like trees. It was a nice smell, but it still wasn’t his normal scent. How Kylo smelled was softer, like being outside after being stuck in school all day. He didn’t need to cover it up. She didn’t want him to. But he wanted to. So she needed to let him.

“I’m sorry I was away for so long,” he finally said.

“I’m sorry I cried.”

She felt his shoulders lift. “You can always cry, Rey. Especially if I made a mistake.”

Rey turned her head, looking up at him. He was looking more like an adult everyday, more like dad. His face was still soft, but his cheekbones were sharper. When he leaned back, she could see the lines of his jaw, cast in shadow. She knew that he hated his nose, but she liked it. Even though the break was caused by Snoke, it still looked perfect on his face. The rest of his body was changing too. She was just getting taller and better at doing everything that made her stronger. Climbing during recess was fun; she was faster than everyone else. The tallest swing set didn’t scare her and she found the right spots to make her way to the top. While her legs were dangling over the edge, she grinned down at her panicked teachers. But Kylo was stronger, bigger and had more muscles. Before, he was just thin. Now, everything she saw had come through training. And eating, when she made him.

She ran her hand down his stomach. It was firm, with delicate ridges. “You’re still my hero.”

“And you’re still the light that came to save me,” he smiled as he spoke. “Rey, can I have a new friend? I won’t if it will make you worried that I’ll be away.”

He shouldn’t have to ask her that. She never asked when she made a new friend. Her conversation with Han echoed in her mind and she forced herself to nod. “Yeah. I’ll be okay. I have Rose and Finn and mom and dad. And Lumpy. We can’t…be together forever.”

Shaking his head, he kissed her forehead gently. “I’m not leaving for college tomorrow. And you’ll come with me when I do.”

“What about my friends?” She asked. And the realization finally clicked in her head.

For a long time, since they were in the real world, they hadn’t had just each other. This wasn’t forever. No matter what he said, the world would keep growing. She cared about other people and he needed to care about more people too.

“We’ll figure it out,” he said. “It’ll be okay.”

She leaned into him and closed her eyes. She wanted to sleep and her head felt heavy instantly. It would always be nice to sleep without worrying that someone would be gone in the morning.

She felt Kylo move off the bed and turn off the ceiling lamp. The light was washed away until he clicked on the lamp on his side and the panic died in her chest.

He lifted her up and she let him put her under the covers, swimming in the fall of sleep. Cuddling next to him, her head on his shoulder, she yawned.

“Goodnight,” he said, pressing his lips against her forehead again.

She nodded, not having the energy to speak.

But she decided that, for a while, she’d only talk to Kylo.

Maybe she could stop having friends and it would just be them if she were silent.

 


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wish me luck teaching tomorrow, fam. i need to get from the neolithic revolution to the middle ages in 90 minutes and i want to die. thanks again for reading. i spent a half an hour lurking in a burger king to try to understand teenage boys. i still don't understand anything.

 

Dance class was mostly hearing the same things said repeatedly. And the only one that would listen was Rey. He’d watch her put her feet together and frown when the others wouldn’t do the same. It was just a bunch of loud kids screaming and not keeping in formation. There was no order. Kylo exhaled through his nose and leaned back, resting against the mat on the floor. He heard Paige sigh beside him and met her eyes when her dark head lay down beside him. Their backpacks were sitting at their feet as they waited.

“Rey’s still not talking.” She was telling him something that he already knew. But she was overreacting. Everyone was. It had only been a few days. She had been quiet before. It would be fine soon. He didn’t spend hours thinking about her silence because it was something that she wanted to do. Why would he stop it?

He wanted to reach out for Paige’s hand when it brushed his, but he stopped himself. She was slim, her taut stomach peaking out from the edges of her shirt. The shape of her lips set off the rest of her angled face. That was what told him how fragile she was; it reminded him of Rey, how her soft spots were also the most attractive parts. She had started dancing again and her body was so thin. He couldn’t touch her without hurting her.

“I know. She told me…” he paused and glanced up. Rey was still smiling and was the best dancer of the group. She would lift her head to the instructor, then hold her pose, and not get distracted by someone else giggling or falling on their ass. “It’s not a big deal.”

Paige swatted at his stomach. “It’s such a big deal if she’s only talking to you. It’s your birthdays soon. How am I supposed to plan something if she won’t tell me what she wants.”

He shrugged. “She’ll tell me and then I’ll tell you. It’s not that hard.”

She rolled her eyes. “Okay, then tell me what you want. You hate little kids parties. You hate being here. So tell me, what’s the plan?”

Sitting up on his elbows, he looked at her with sharp eyes, questioning why she had thought so much about it. “Rey just wants her, Rose and Finn, and some other kids. The blonde girl there, I think. She wants pizza and to watch a movie. I don’t really care about anything else but getting my license.”

“But it’s your sixteenth birthday, Kylo. God, how are you being selfish without actually being selfish?” Paige sounded more annoyed than she needed to be. He checked his watch to make sure that they really needed to be there another hour. It was for Rey so his glance was quick, making sure she didn’t see him getting bored.

“I’m not…” he started, then let out a long sigh, clenching and unclenching his hand. “Do you know Poe Dameron?”

“Poe? Yeah, he’s a total suck up to all the teachers. And he really wants to eat lunch with us. He keeps moving closer, sitting with people he doesn’t know. Don’t you talk to him at practice?” Paige flipped her hair, sitting up to wave at her sister.

Kylo fell easily into his own head. At practice that week, only a few days after rooming together, Poe had asked to pair with him. It didn’t make sense at first—he was smaller and weaker and didn’t have most of the basic stuff down. That’s why he lost so easily. When Kylo realized why he wanted to room with him, and it was all about getting better at the sport, he started to back down on his idea of him actually wanting to be his friend. He was out for himself, like everyone else.

“I don’t really talk at practice. But he does.” He sighed and shut his eyes. “All the time.”

Paige touched his arm, making him look at her. “Then let him come and sit with us at lunch. He’s probably asked you. Don’t be a dummy. Kylo, you see so many things that we all miss. You’re trying to make me decide for you. And I don’t like it. I never like it.”

Poe had. He had been packing up his bag after practice, looking forward to showering at home when Poe had walked up to him, just a towel around his waist and asked him after a long explanation about how he wanted to room with him again on the next trip. It had sent his mind down the usual road of doubt. It was frustrating when someone would tell him what they wanted, but he didn’t understand what they were really out after.

The image of a fading bruise along Poe’s ribs made him also wonder if he’d done that when he’d thrown him hard against the mat. But the bruise wasn’t new. It wouldn’t have been so black if it had been him.

“Sorry. I’m…I keep thinking about Hux.” His words were true, but he said what he didn’t mean. “Maybe we can just hang out at my house. I’ll ask Poe to come. The kids can play games and draw and Rey will be happy. And we can just…”

“What? Watch them? Kylo, you’re bored right now. She won’t be happy if you’re bored at your own birthday.” Paige’s face was getting red with frustration. “We should celebrate. You’ll get your license and we should do something special. Rey is happy when _you’re_ happy.”

He looked up at her and frowned slightly. It only made Paige roll her eyes.

“Okay, so I’ll tell you what to do. Your birthday is on a Friday. I know that you’ll take your driver’s after school. So we do something then. Something that’s just for you. We can hang out at my place and play games. And then on the Saturday, we make it all about Rey and the kids. Maybe have a sleepover at your place after or something. It’s not for like two weeks so you can freak out about it now and get used to the idea by then.” She was doing what she said, telling him exactly what he wanted. He’d made that happen. “God, Kylo, sometimes you’re so frustrating.”

He knew he was. But it didn’t stop him amongst his peers. Paige’s hair fell around her eyes and she actually smirked at him when she turned to look at him again, the anger fading from her face.

“But that’s what you want, right?”

“Yes,” he answered.

The instructor started calling for the girls in the background. And Paige nodded, saying that she’d fix it for him.

The only thing he forgot was that he didn’t want Liza to be there.

 

-=-

 

He threw himself into his father’s arms without restraint when the test giver, a heavy and ancient woman, told him that he’d passed. Kylo felt his father’s embrace encircle him, hugging him tighter, and wanted to ruin the moment. He wanted to tell him that this just meant that he was getting away. He was one step closer to leaving.

But he held his tongue and parted, seeing the shining look of pride in Han’s eyes.

He couldn’t hurt him just then.

 

-=-

 

“…and then we packed up and left Florida. It was like, bam, goodbye sunshine and the beach, hello stupid Connecticut. Mom had a job. Dad wanted to get away from the people he’d loaned money from. He’s such a fucking asshole. Then they made me change schools this year. Because he’s such a fucking asshole.” Poe’s story had gone on for too long, but he’d actually been listening, not imagining some dark scenario out of nothing.

Kylo sat beside him on the couch, accepting the intrusion of having feet on his lap as Poe stretched out to look at the girls. The card game had ended long ago in favour of talking and listening to music that he hated. Kylo didn’t want to say anything, but it was good to let the others talk.

They had drifted from school to movies, then to music. Then, finally, Paige lifted her shoulders and asked why Poe had moved there. It broke the question that they had all been thinking about. It took him several detours to get to the answer, but when he heard it, he started to feel a bit more at ease. The clearer people were to him, the easier it would be to build on the friendship, or whatever it was.

Liza pursed her lips and let her chin fall forward. She was wearing a new bra and he could see it peaking out from under her tank top. It was a shade of pink, almost salmon. Paige, at least, could put on a bra without wanting to show it off to everyone. “You could have said you just didn’t want to. I say that to my dad all the time.”

“Yeah, well, I can’t do that. Maybe you’re a daddy’s girl. Ever think about that?” Poe sat up a little and levelled a look at her. Kylo caught the tone of his voice and agreed with his defensive reaction.

Liza firmed her mouth. “I’m totally not.”

“You are,” Kylo added. He thought about Liza’s room, the few times he’d stepped foot into it before leaving for the openness of the living room. She had too many things: posters, electronics, childish stuffed animals. She clung to her childhood and he wanted to rip it all up so she’d be on his level.

“Oh, shut up. You get whatever you ask for too. So just…shut up.” She flipped her hair and stood. Kylo didn’t watch her leave for the washroom, but knew that the other two did.

“Wow, she’s such a bitch,” Poe said, openly. He reached for the soda that Paige’s mom had bought them. She had offered them something stronger earlier, but all of them had exchanged looks of pure embarrassment at the offer. Kylo had just stared blankly before realizing that the other three were too afraid to say what they really wanted. There had been sparkling wine at his house when everyone had arrived, shared by everyone except Rey, even though he knew it had hardly anything in there to get them drunk. He’d checked the bottle. Paige had looked at her glass like she was sad to be told to grow up and only sipped at it in slow gestures. He did the same, but more so because he hated the smell.

But it had been what he wanted.

They were in the backyard of his home on a cool March evening and they raised their glasses to what he did and had done on his own. It wasn’t about fighting demons or killing murderers; it had been about studying and practicing. He did what sixteen year olds should do. Rey had hugged him and told him she was so happy for him without saying anything. It had been around the others so he understood her silence.

And Poe had smiled at him, breaking the awkwardness that he’d felt since he arrived.

It was harder than he thought to get his phone number. He’d always duck away after practice, saying something smart and then leaving before Kylo could ask. On the last road trip, he finally found the words and asked him if he wanted to come the following week. Poe had only smirked at him, making him regret his decision.

Then he said that he had already bought him a present.

He didn’t want anything. At least Liza knew that now. There was no awkwardly wrapped gift waiting for him there of some motion of love and longing. Instead, he had the small gift from Poe, tucked away into his pocket. He’d given it to him privately, a wry smile on his face in a moment alone before leaving for Paige’s.

The only present he wanted would come from Rey the next day, at her party. Or maybe at breakfast. She wouldn’t be able to wait that long. The joys of birthdays were slowly becoming some of her favourite emotions to explore.

“Shut up, she’s my best friend,” Paige said, reaching for her own drink. But her hand paused and she pursed her lips. “But she can get a little bitchy.”

He tilted his head at Paige at the words. He was used to catching these types of things when it was about him, but not other people. As the thought took over he recalled how Paige and Liza would talk around him. Since Hux left the group, who did Paige have? As much as it pained him, who did Liza have? The twisted dynamics only smacked him in the face when Poe jerked his foot away and he realized that he’d been drawing small circles against the skin of his ankle.

His cheeks burned and he dropped his head. Paige said that she needed to check on Liza and left the room. That’s when Poe kicked him lightly.

“It’s okay. You were just thinking.” Poe’s eyes were telling the truth. He could feel it, or at least he hoped that his mind wasn’t fooling him into seeing what he wanted. “I don’t mind.”

Then he stretched his feet out onto his lap again and smiled at him, sending his mind onto the brink of touching his deeper thoughts. He was invading his space and he should have pushed him away, yet his anxiety about his group of friends and where he was prevented him from bringing up a reaction. Being steps underground made him still feel like he couldn’t breathe most of the time. There was too much darkness below ground. Paige’s basement was filled with life but he could still see the way things could go if people made different choices. Things could always be connected; no one walked through life untouched by others.

Paige danced back into the room, looking more apprehensive than she usually did. She finished her awkward spin and her shoulders slumped. “So, um, Liza wants to go. But she’s staying here. So I don’t want to kick you out but…Kylo, she’s being weird. Like, weirder than usual. And I can’t deal with so much weirdness. Maybe she’ll be okay in a bit.”

Poe gave him a look. It was like the ones that he would get from Rey.

And he realized that it was time to go.

 

-=-

 

He was starting to feel less awkward around Poe. They had really only been alone in the hotel room, but that wasn’t anywhere familiar to begin with; it had the illusion of being a place he’d been before but that was part of the illusion. Their teammates and coach were there. It wasn’t taking the path to his house that he’d followed so many times before, but with other people.

“Hey, are you worried about her?” Poe asked, in between kicking at stones on their path. The grass had a faint tinge of white; it hadn’t snowed but it was colder than it had been that afternoon.

It was always easy to fall into old memories. He saw an echo of Hux’s shadow on the ground before he lifted his head to look at Poe, reminding him that he was there now. Not in the before.

“Paige will be fine. I’ll talk to her tomorrow. Or maybe tonight.”

Poe paused and then kept walking. “I meant Liza.”

“I don’t care about her,” he said, knowing that his voice was sharp. “And don’t look at me like that.”

Poe nudged him. “Like what?”

“You know what I mean.” He wanted him to stop. He wanted to be alone in that moment. There were too many things to sort out and piece together. That’s why he hated being around too many people. Even with just three others, he’d have to always put together what he did wrong and what he’d probably do wrong again.

It was easier with just him and Rey.

Just thinking about her made his head drop again. He stopped walking and looked up at the night’s sky. For once, Poe was silent. He tried to find the right star patterns, but his head was too twisted. Nothing settled. There were too many things swirling.

Poe’s arms hung loosely at his slide. “Hey, I can just go home. You want to be alone and I’m coming back tomorrow. I probably upset them. I was talking shit about my dad and it pissed me off.”

Kylo lifted his hand and shook his head. “You can’t walk home. And it’s too late to ask for a ride. Just shut up.”

Poe bit his lip and dipped his head. “You’re thinking?”

“I’m always thinking.” It was a half lie. Most of the time, he was just drifting in and out of where he was, where he wanted to be, and back to a place he never wanted to return to but still did time and time again.

The remark made Poe smile and start walking again. He’d guessed right with that remark when it came to what he was expected to say.

They neared the corner to his house and his mouth felt loose. “The first time I was at Paige’s house, Hux and I walked back this way. And there were these reporters outside. We had to sneak around back.”

He looked at the street. It looked so similar, like it was in his mind. He could see the ghosts of the news vans in the haunted corners. But he kept talking, comforted by the strange presence of his new friend. “We got into a fight in the alley. He yelled at me. I…I asked him if he still wanted to be my friend and he said he did. He was a fucking liar.”

The last part he yelled. He didn’t hear it until he saw Poe’s eyes.

“I don’t really know the guy but…yeah. He…if he lied, then fuck him.” Poe seemed to recover quickly, looking back up the street as he shuffled his shoes in the lingering crystals on the pavement. “I don’t want to wake up Rey. But you really need to talk and you never want to talk. So I don’t know what to do right now. You keep so much in your head. Paige told me. Liza even told me. We’re friends now so I can say this shit. I guess.”

“You guess?” He tried to seem taller, to glare down at the boy who hadn’t even turned fifteen yet.

Still, there was a daring smirk on that face. “Yeah, and I think I’ve guessed right.”

He looked down at his feet, daring to open his thoughts to Poe. “Liza kissed me that night.”

“Wait, what?” Poe’s mouth quirked into a smile and then it quickly faded. “It doesn’t look like you’re too happy about it.”

Folding his arms, Kylo was torn between wanting to shut up and to keep talking, to run or stay where he was. He’d let Poe invade his personal space so it felt right to let him into his thoughts. He could see his house, but he didn’t want to be there either. Still, Rey was there. Frustrated, he sat down on one of his neighbour’s lawns. Mrs Sebulba wouldn’t mind. She would walk around in the middle of winter in just a housecoat and call him by his father’s name. He’d just blame it on him if she woke up.

The grass was cold and stiff when he rubbed his eyes. He saw Poe shifting his weight from side to side. Then, he nodded and sat down next to him, resting a hand on his shoulder. He almost looked at him with surprise when a flinch did not follow.

“When was this? Like right after you got home?” The hand was then quickly withdrawn when he eyed it before nodding. That was close enough. “That’s…pretty fucked.”

“Yeah. Pretty fucked.” He closed his eyes and exhaled, his breath warming his hands. “That was when everyone was obsessed with me. Now, I’m sort of glad that they’ve kind of forgot about it. I mean, I haven’t. Rey hasn’t. My parents haven’t. But…yeah.”

Poe was looking up at the streetlight, before turning back to him. “So, I have this cousin. And I promise that this is leading to something, so don’t tell me to shut up. He’s like five years older than me or something. It’s dad’s side of the family so… I don’t want to call them trash, but they are. But I liked him when I was a kid. He’d play baseball with me and let me use his computer. Anyway, right before we moved, he killed three people in a drive-by. One was just a little kid, someone’s baby. It felt like…knowing that someone could just kill other people because he wanted to, and how easy it is, it was hard to feel safe again. That guy that took you, that motherfucker, had parents. He was somehow born and decided to destroy other people’s lives. All I’m saying is that, I probably don’t understand a tenth of what happened to you. But I get how it feels to always think that you’re not safe and anyone can turn into what we’re afraid of. And that it’s possible those things could be inside you too.”

There was something real in those words, despite how he wanted to argue that he didn’t understand what he was experiencing at all. That’s how he felt at the beginning of the story, but at the end, Poe had done what he’d promised. He had a point. And he got there the long way. He’d only heard second-hand information. He wasn’t Hux, who’d heard too much. He wasn’t Paige, who he was afraid of hurting. He just wanted to be his friend.

The sincerity in his eyes cracked something inside of him.

“I killed him. Someone must have told you that. I strangled him and it felt…good. He had made me hurt other kids and was going to kill Rey. The FBI had started to figure out where he was. I don’t think he was going to kill me, but I’m probably wrong. I feel like I’m dead all of the time. I think sometimes that he thought that he had me under control somehow. And that’s how I got him. That’s not in that stupid book, but the part about me killing him is there.” Tired, Kylo flopped down onto the grass and tried to focus on the stars in order to keep talking. Poe’s head rested beside his, following his eyes upwards. “Maybe everyone is right. Maybe I will kill someone else some day.”

“But only if they deserve it?”

He glanced over, meeting the other boy’s eyes under the streetlamp. “That’s…exactly. But isn’t that wrong too? The doctors try to get me to talk about this shit and then they won’t get it.”

“Nah, they’re making it more complicated. It’s like in class. You get a problem, there’s a formula, and you solve it. Easy, right? But if you sit and think about it too much, you think it might be another formula and you get the wrong answer. That’s what they’re doing. And they’re giving you the wrong answers.” Kylo didn’t actually agree but nodded lightly when Poe finished his stretched metaphor.

He heard a car approaching and it forced him to sit up. The car slowed, then kept driving. He brushed the cold out of his jeans and looked over at Poe. “I don’t really talk about this.”

“Yeah, makes sense why you don’t. Everyone’s obsessed with themselves and hearing that someone else has had it worse pisses everyone off. Suddenly your own shitty life isn’t the shittiest.” Poe sat up too and stood, reaching down to him.

He eyed the hand and thought about the gesture rather than the words. It was easier to zone out into that abyss than admit that Poe was right.

Gripping the offered hand, he got to his feet. Looking down at Poe, he lifted his lips into a light smile. “I used to hate you.”

“Yeah, I know.” Poe grinned. “But I got under your skin. Because I don’t give up.”

They walked in silence back to his house.

And he had to hold his tongue to prevent himself from saying that he probably should.

 

 


	14. Chapter 14

Rey blinked awake when two sets of feet enter Kylo’s room. It was late, but not that late. Still, it was late enough to make her stomach hurt and her eyes feel sandy. She sat up and scratched away the unpleasant sensation, trying to force herself to be awake.

She remembered Poe. He was the boy that Kylo had been so worried about. When she’d met him that day, she couldn’t really understand the problem. He had softly curled hair and expressive brown eyes. She guessed he was cute. His eyebrows could shift in a second, catching her in a look that made her feel safe. She liked him the moment that she saw him.

And he was the first person she talked to other than Kylo.

Poe had come into the kitchen when she was looking for scissors to cut the wrapping paper for Kylo’s gift. Leia had given her twenty dollars to buy a frame for the picture she’d drawn at the mall that day. She’d gotten help putting the work in the frame, but then the phone rang and everything started to get rushed. If she didn’t get it done now, it would never be finished. It was a really good picture too. There were no gaps in the colours. She could hear everyone else outside, but she needed to do it in that moment when Kylo was distracted.

 _Hey, sweet pea. What’s going on?_ Poe had asked, opening the fridge. She had quirked her head and looked up from the drawer where the scissors usually were. He took out a milk carton and poured himself a glass. He didn’t even ask.

She bit her lip, determined not to talk to anyone. She didn’t talk to her teachers or mom and dad. Just Kylo. Then she saw how the milk beaded on Poe’s mouth and giggled.

 _I need help with Kylo’s present_ , she said. _Can you help me? I’m not good at wrapping things. I never got to do it before that many times._

Poe grinned and nodded, leaving his glass beside the sink. _Yeah, sure. Let’s do it_.

Upstairs, in her room and not Kylo’s, Poe showed her how to rip paper without scissors. He folded the sheet and winked at her before tearing it along the edge of her desk. He made it look easy. He had a real smile, one that she wanted to see more of. When he handed her the paper and she got to try, she felt like the next day would be even better with him there. He looked at the picture with a bright look on his face. He told her it was something he thought Kylo would like. And when the picture was wrapped, it looked perfect.

And now he was lurking awkwardly in the same doorway with Kylo, looking like they both had secrets. Poe was gripping his backpack, shifting from side to side.

“It’s really late,” she mumbled, looking at the two of them with a frown. She always tried to hold back when she felt like this. Just the sound of her own voice when she was this exhausted made her feel small and not six years old ye. She was just a baby, a small kid who couldn’t go anywhere. This was why she hated talking most of the time; other times, it came from selfish reasons that she could never keep.

Her friends had only come around her more, wanting to help her in school. Rose would still sit with her and try to guess what she wanted. Finn would run and get any toy or activity that she looked at. There was a pile of paint kits on their table by the end of the first morning. She’d been mad at first, but couldn’t stay that way. Tomorrow, she’d talk. Tomorrow would be her party and she didn’t want to hate anything on her birthday.

The idea of being born was still something that she couldn’t quite understand. She knew she’d been smaller and had gotten bigger. Kylo was growing all of the time and she couldn’t stop it. She knew she’d been born to save Kylo, but there were other reasons she was alive now. Her friends needed her and so did mom and dad. But the world was too big and she was too small. At school sometimes she could turn invisible and float outside of her body. It was a good power to have when started to see Snoke lurking in doorways or in the back of her classroom. He wasn’t really there, but she still didn’t want him to see her.

“Shit, Kylo, I have to get up really early tomorrow I should just go…” Poe started to say.

Her mind drifted but she was sure that she heard Kylo say it was okay to sleep in their bed. She weakly lifted her head and nodded. Both boys broke from their annoying conversation and silently stared back at her.

It was 10 p.m. and her birthday party was tomorrow. She had been happy that Kylo got his license and wanted to spend time with his friends, but it had meant too much time alone to think. She had checked the tape on the package several times during the day, making sure it was like it was the previous time that she looked at it. She wanted to feel good the next day. There were few times that she could not deal with Kylo being nervous. It would be better if they both slept right now and he stopped thinking about it.

“You can sleep here. There’s a sleeping bag,” she said to Poe, her mind cloudy. “Everybody just needs to sleep.”

Poe looked at her and his smile made her grin again. “Sure thing, sweet pea. Be right there.”

 

-=-

 

Kylo was focused on brushing his teeth with Poe standing beside him. Looking at him in the mirror, watching him mush his toothbrush with a heavy hand against his teeth, he’d rather have been in the hotel room.

Poe leaned forward and rinsed his mouth. “Everything okay?”

Kylo just shook his head. “She talked to you.”

“Yeah. I was there.”

“But she…”

Poe stared back at him in the mirror. “Don’t be a dick right now. You said that she wasn’t talking. Now she’s talking. That’s good right? She talked to me earlier today too. So is there something wrong about that?” Poe asked. He looked sincere with the question, not like he was about to mock him.

“No, but she won’t talk to her teachers. But she’s talking to you. She just hates her voice right now,” he said, stepping back, suddenly realizing how bare he was. It had been too quick to change in his room. He had put on his normal sleep clothes: just his shorts. But Poe was mostly fully clothed, probably having forgot his pyjamas. “It’s been going on for a couple of weeks. She can only talk to me. Everyone is freaking out, but she’ll be okay. She has friends and likes school. She just doesn’t want to talk right now.”

“That’s a little…strange. But I guess if she’ll be fine, then who cares what everyone thinks. She can do what she wants.” Poe wasn’t looking at him. He was looking at the holes in his socks again.

He realized he felt mostly strange because this wasn’t a hotel room. This was his home.

And Poe wasn’t Hux.

Rey was curled up into one corner of the bed and they had another shared look.

“I can totally sleep downstairs,” Poe said in a whisper, leaning closer.

“No,” he answered. He wasn’t sure why he wanted to test Poe but he was tired of his boasts and bravado during the day and the odd softness and openness he’d shown that night. He opened his closet and retrieved the old sleeping bag from the top shelf. There wasn’t any dust, but he expected there to be. Handing it to Poe, he shrugged and sat on the bed, touching Rey’s leg through the blanket. She mumbled turned away, shifting to the other edge of the bed, away from him.

Poe still stood near the doorway and turned off the light, letting him turn on his lamp.

“She doesn’t like the lights off?” He asked, his voice dropping to a whisper. “Um, do you want to talk for a bit?”

He shifted under the sheets and tossed a pillow down on the floor. “Yeah, if you want.”

Biting his lip, Poe stripped down to his boxers and spread out the sleeping bag. There was always a thrill to make someone else uncomfortable. Part of him still wanted Poe to back off and not want to be his friend. He was daring him to turn around and leave, to not want to deal with his shit anymore. Hux left. Poe could leave too.

Instead he just sat up and shrugged at him, motioning around the room. “I…like your house. Your parents must be loaded.

Lying down, he shut his eyes at the comment. Rey was facing away from them, but he still dropped his voice. “I don’t know. They’re buying me the car that I want. But I don’t really want anything that they can buy. They know that too.”

The thought continued to pound in the back of his mind: this wasn’t talking in the hotel room. This wasn’t training in the gym with the others. They were having a conversation in his bedroom.

“Guess that’s why you didn’t bother to ask them if I could stay over.” Poe’s smirk was enough to make him smile too.

“The girls were supposed to come over tomorrow evening. It was something Paige planned, but probably won’t happen now.” He rested against his pillow, looking directly into Poe’s eyes. “I’m sorry that I didn’t open your present yet. You shouldn’t have got me anything.”

“Want to know what it is?” Poe had trouble keeping secrets. Kylo knew that he should be more guarded. But he couldn’t. “Okay, I’ll tell you. You always wear that armband, the bracelet. I got my grandma to send me one. It’s really nice and handmade. I think she made it herself. I saw somewhere that it was your birthday and I thought I’d give it to you on the next road trip or something. So I guess I got lucky and I get to hang out with you here rather than sleeping on the couch at home.”

Kylo narrowed his eyes. “I don’t like gifts. But thanks.”

“Yeah, don’t mention it. And don’t feel like you have to get me anything. My birthday is next month. Maybe we can just go to a movie or something.” Poe’s eyes looked serious for a moment and the tension only passed when Kylo nodded. “Good. Goodness. Maybe we’ll take Rey too. I don’t really care which movie we watch. Kid shit still makes me laugh.”

“She’d like that. She’s getting better with movies,” he said. “If she’s talking to you, I think that she’d really like that.”

Poe nodded and closed his eyes for a second before opening them again. “I’m sorry for that story before. No matter how shitty I feel and how fucked up my life is, I don’t have a drop in the bucket compared to you and Rey. It’s all…I think I talk so much just to…”

“Not hear yourself think,” Kylo said quickly, to finish the sentence. “I do that with my parents. And sometimes with Rey. She knows I’m doing it to distract myself. She’s six and I feel like I’m too much for her.”

“Hey, but now you have me, right?” Poe looked at him with desperation that he tried to hide behind a joking grin. He had the same loneliness that he saw from Hux. It drew him in, downwards, into wanting to accept him. He’d already started and he rarely gave up finishing something that was in motion, despite knowing the outcome.

“Yeah. Goodnight.” He closed his eyes and rolled over.

He heard Poe sigh and then the sound of the sleeping bag rustle. “Yeah, night.”

 

-=-

 

A nightmare woke her. It was about being sucked down into blood until she started choking. Bubbles popped against her face. The smell was real. The slickness of the liquid pulled her down deeper until she couldn’t breathe. It had been happening more and more. Rey could wake herself without screaming, but it was still heavy to force herself to move and not rouse Kylo. He hadn’t been sleeping well lately. He’d been worried about his driver’s exam, even though he’d say that he knew he would pass. Sighing, she didn’t bother to open her eyes. She turned over, rolling around until she found arms and cuddled into them.

 

-=-

 

Poe woke him up at five thirty. He stood there, arms folded across his chest and eyes shifting. Kylo wanted to ask if he’d had another nightmare, but he was sure he hadn’t this time. But that wasn’t it: he needed to get to work. Shaking off the sleep, he gently slid Rey off of his chest and got up, despite how his body resisted it.

“What?” He asked, mouth and head still struggling with being awake.

Poe was already dressed, and nodded in quick jerks. His eyes dropped a little and he scratched at his eyebrow. “Yeah, I um. Yeah. And I have to get there before six. And I didn’t want to wake you up until now…can you ask your dad or something?”

He didn’t need to ask his dad; the warm thought blossomed and pulled him fully out of sleep. Shaking his head, he smirked a little. Poe’s mouth quirked with confusion as he shoved by him to pull on his jeans. No, he didn’t need his dad, because he knew where the keys were. He grabbed his t-shirt and motioned for Poe to head downstairs. No one else was up yet, but he saw the bags of groceries waiting for the day on the counter.

They had slipped their shoes back on and he had the keys to his father’s car in his hands when the backdoor opened. Han stood there, squinting at them, Lumpy’s leash in his hand. The dog barked, his tail wagging, as he spotted them.

“Where’re you two off to so early?” Han blocked the door and Kylo straightened his shoulders.

“Poe has to go to work. I’m taking the car.” He felt Poe tense behind him but ignored it for now.

Han slowly stepped back, letting them leave. He was waiting for him to remind him that there were still rules that he had to follow for the next few months. It had been in the study guide and they both knew them.

Still, he let them go.

“Hey, look I appreciate it but…” Poe started as he opened the door to the garage.

Kylo just shrugged him off. His father’s car was between them as the gears and winches to the garage door grinded to life. The dim light of the spring morning spilled in and he opened the driver’s door. After tapping the roof of the car, Poe got in. They backed out and he was finally driving for the first time without his parents. He could go anywhere, but he would come back.

“You could probably get away with anything with your parents, but the police might stop us.” Poe’s seatbelt clicked and he quickly mirrored the action. “That might help, but they still might.”

“They won’t.” He faked confidence, but let a real grin spread across his face. “It’s too early.”

It was a longer drive than he thought, but the streets were empty. Poe was clutching his backpack the entire time but in a quick glance, he saw the grip start to loosen as they neared a grocery store on the other side of town. When he had parked, he looked over and frowned.

“You didn’t have to be nervous,” he said, confused by how quiet his friend had been.

“Nah, I didn’t. But I do need you to not tell anyone about this.” Poe was looking at the dashboard, his face in a deep frown. He looked up and his eyes firmed. “I’m serious, Kylo.”

“It’s…” He trailed off and shook his head. “It’s fine. Don’t worry.”

Finally, the apprehension faded from his face. “Great. I’ll see you tonight then.”

The door slammed shut and Kylo kept his eyes forward, stopping himself from watching the other boy run inside. He was staring at nothing, eyes unfocused. While he normally sought out a feeling of numbness, the one that washed over him now wasn’t as pleasant.

Another car pulling up beside him forced him into action and he started the car again. At least now he was annoyed at an intrusion and not just the wasteland of his uncertain mind.

He drove home with less caution now, speeding a little on empty stretches, trying to untangle what had happened. The look on Poe’s face told him he was embarrassed to show him that part of his life. He was a freshman; he could get a job if he wanted one. Rolling his eyes at himself, he sighed at how slow he had been to put the pieces together. He didn’t want to have a job; he had to get one. He clenched the steering wheel at the thought as he pulled into the back alley.

No wonder Poe thought he could get anything that he wanted. It was true for things that could be bought, like shoes, a car, a phone, but what he really wanted would always be out of his reach. His parents couldn’t buy back seven years of his life, lost to torture and confinement. He sat in the car, neatly parked in the garage, and let the frustrating idea take hold. He couldn’t shake the growing bitterness at how he was still encountering unfairness in the world and discrepancies between how he knew the world worked and how he thought it should. It was slowly being forced down his throat and he didn’t want to accept it. Maz would always push him into thinking about empathy and how he dealt with others. He already had enough inside of him, he thought. Rey had to feel for others but he just had to survive and try to predict how they wanted him to react.

His father was waiting for him on the back porch with two mugs of coffee.

“It didn’t have time to get cold,” Han said as Kylo’s boots made the back steps creak. “How’d it go?”

Shrugging, he accepted the cup, too wound up in his mind to argue. “Fine. I know I shouldn’t have done that, but…I didn’t think you’d be awake. And it really didn’t take long.”

Han’s mouth was set in a soft line. “No. No it didn’t. But even when you have your own car, it’s not really legal to drive around with your friends. And I hate saying this to you, because you know it’s a law.”

“It’s a stupid one.” He sipped at his coffee and then frowned. “And I won’t.”

He was lying, but his father still clapped his shoulder. Clearing his throat, Han took a heavy step away to lean against the railing. “I had to get a job at his age too. I get why you were helping him out.”

He stood in the silence, watching the steam rise from his mug. An ache that he was well accustomed to by now spread in his stomach: someone was being wronged and he couldn’t do anything about it. Maz was wrong; he felt too much and that’s why he desperately wanted to push those thoughts away. It was a feeling that was easy to hide when he was at school, surrounded by people who either ignored him or hated him. He didn’t care what most of them thought about him on good days. Right now, he was too disoriented to dredge up how he felt on bad days.

But the feeling still cracked through, mingling with his residual confusion and anger at the gray areas of the world. He clenched his teeth. Fighting down rage wasn’t something he could do today. It would be a day filled with too many people and too many situations he could be trapped in. The thought made it even hard to press down the feelings. His hand gripped his cup and if he’d been alone, he’d have thrown it across the yard.

“I need to shower before breakfast,” he finally said, shaking hands resting the mug and the keys on the railing.

His father gave him a soft look, one that he hadn’t seen in too many years.

They parted with a nod and Kylo cursed his resolve to never cut himself at home.

 

-=-

 

_Can’t come. I’m beyond sorry. I’ll tell you on Monday._

_Why not?_

_I can’t really text more or call you. But I WILL tell you on Monday._

Kylo didn’t reply.

 

 


	15. Chapter 15

 

Rey was watching herself from outside of her body. She was floating above everyone, feeling happy that her friends were there. She was almost too afraid to come down and ruin it by telling them she had been watching from above. Kaydel had showed up a half an hour late, pouting. She whined to her when her mother left that her socks didn’t match. Rose told her that she thought her socks still matched, even though they weren’t the same pattern. Finn didn’t get why it was a problem. Rey had just smiled and said that she was glad they were all there.

No one reacted, except for everyone who was older than five or six. She hadn’t talked during breakfast. She had hummed a little as she put syrup on her pancakes and sung random sounds during her bath, but everything else had been about meeting eyes and making motions.

Paige had came by with Rose for lunch, before everyone else came. Paige smiled at Kylo, but then said that Liza wasn’t coming; that made Rey glad. She didn’t have a problem with Liza, but she knew that Kylo didn’t always want to deal with her. He was waiting for Poe and so was she. She was glad that Kylo had a new friend, almost a best friend again. She guessed that Rose was her best friend, mostly because Finn didn’t know who he wanted to be better friends with. It was so annoying that he couldn’t make up his mind about such a simple thing: it didn’t matter. Most people didn’t have a favourite person. She did, but Rey knew that everything about her was drastically different than her friends. It wasn’t a bad thing, but was made up of tiny wrongs that piled up over time.The first time that she went swimming, she realized how apparent her scars were. It had been a warm day, the first summer of their freedom. Kylo hadn’t wanted to take his t-shirt off. He had ducked his head and held her hand as they walked to the edge of the pool. She was used to Kylo being brave, but faced with a pool of screaming children and teenagers, he shied away. It was like back at the hospital, when she started seeing the seams in his armour. He had been afraid before, but this fear wasn’t from terror. Then she looked down at her own legs and saw the lines and marks and stepped back. He noticed her movements and quickly took off his shirt and took her hand. _We are how we are. Don’t ever feel bad because I do._

Kylo really did understand when he’d made a mistake and was worried that it would make her feel different than others.

But he didn’t believe it himself. He just stopped caring. Or at least he said he did.

Rey knew what he cared about. And also knew when he was lying.

The entire morning, leading up to the arrival of her friends and Paige, had been spread out with small lies or at least smaller lies. They were the lies that she could tell when she had to sit at a dinner with food that she’d never had before. She wanted to try it, but when she did, she had to look at the people around her and pretended that she liked it. It took a few tries to learn that if she said that she liked something, then it would be served again. People, especially adults, only tried to make others happy. It wasn’t their fault that she didn’t understand what they meant.

Those thoughts were rolling over her as she watched herself play with her friends. Paige was sitting on the big couch, telling them what to do with their felt figures. Rey knew that Paige wanted to be a teacher and that it would be great if Paige could teach her class when she got older. Paige had smiled, but shook her head; there was no way she would be teaching junior high or high school. They were supposed to cut out forms and make them into people. Somehow, everyone had a problem with that. Most of the problems had started when Rey took all of the black and had to start cutting off pieces of the others.

She watched herself happily helping the others until Kylo threw his phone across the room. It hit the kitchen island with a violent crack and she was pulled back down into her body.

He didn’t look at anyone before he left, escaping into the cold of the back porch.

Paige’s expressive face followed her eyes. “I guess we should ignore him? That’s what I do.”

Rey shrugged and put her felt figure to the side. “He will want to apologize. I can’t let him wait that long.”

Paige’s cheeks were red when she met Rey’s eyes again. “Maybe I sometimes make him wait too long.”

“It’s okay.” Lifting her shoulders, Rey couldn’t see anything wrong with that. “He’s not a kid. I'll be right back.”

Rey ignored her friends and picked up Kylo’s phone from the floor. The screen still looked okay. She hit the button and made sure that it wasn’t cracked. The last year he’d broken three phones by being careless or openly violent. He really did care, but sometimes he needed to explode. Rey would rather it be with a phone than with someone else.

The phone in her small hand, she opened the door to the porch. Kylo was sitting on the small bench, his arms folded.

“It’s not broken this time,” she said, handing it towards him with firm hands.

He looked at it and let it fall to the ground. “I don’t want it right now.”

She looked down at the phone then back at him. She quirked her head and her frown deepened.

“I’m not trying to ruin your birthday. I’ll be…better in a few minutes.” He rubbed his eyes and ran his hand through his hair. It was thick and black and Rey loved touching it at night. But right now, it looked like it caused Kylo pain. She hated it when he was only in his head. It was one of the few places that she could not draw him out from. He stopped making sense. The more that he grew up, the more that Kylo saw of the world, the more the gap widened. He had a hard time explaining it to her when it came to things like school and friends.

“Poe’s not coming?” The thought struck her and she blurted out the words before she could take them back.

Kylo’s look was narrowed and dark when he looked at her. “I told him things about what happened to us. And now he’s not coming. That probably means he hates us and will be like Hux on Monday. I can’t…Maybe I should stop looking for best friends. You’re probably right. Boys are dumb.”

Just hearing him saying those words made Rey laugh. “Boys _are_ dumb. But you’re not supposed to say that. He’s not mean, Kylo. And he’s not lying. I like him.”

He pursed his lips. “I like him too. That’s what makes this hard.”

Rey felt warmth blossom in her chest. Kylo wanted to be friends with Poe. He actually wanted something. She had wanted to see Kylo smile, his real smile, when she gave him his present later on that day. But right now, she just wanted him to calm down and be back with the others. He hated people, but he didn’t hate kids.

“What did he say?” She asked, shifting her weight from side to side.

Kylo looked at her and then frowned at the garage. “That we’d talk on Monday.”

“Then don’t think the worst,” she grinned, hugging him on the bench. “Come inside, please.”

His arm fell around her and she sighed into his half hug. “I’ll be in soon.”

Pulling away, she picked up his phone again and put it in his hands. He didn’t drop it this time.

She sat back down and looked at her cut out, thinking about how much easier things would be for everyone if she could fix things for Kylo. She thought again about how she wanted to make things better in the past for all of them. Her birthday party would have been bigger, with so many children that would never have been made gone or end up forgotten. It would have made Kylo a different person if Snoke had never hurt him and made him do bad things. He’d be softer with everyone, not just with her.

 

 

-=-

 

Leia leaned over and looked at him. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, stop asking,” he said through gritted teeth. He kept his eye forward, staring off through the windshield. “When can I get my car?”

His mother gave him a neutral look. He couldn’t break through what her eyes meant and it frustrated him more. It happened only occasionally as he watched her get better hiding being hurt or insulted by him. She would close off those parts, trying to love what he was now rather than what he should be. She was wrong to do that. “Well, we’ll see.”

“That’s not an answer.” He almost wanted to pout as he rested his head on the window.

Their car was parked far from the entrance of the school. Leia slowly turned to look at him as she put the car in gear, getting closer to the main door. Of course, she’d do that. Of course she’d pressure him into acting out. He hadn’t ruined Rey’s birthday. He had come inside again and tried to listen to what Paige was telling him but his thoughts really were elsewhere. Even at night, when Rey was telling him which parts of the day were her favourite, he could only manage short nods before he forced himself to listen to her and actively show her that she was loved.

That’s when she gave him the present she’d made for him and told him that Poe helped her wrap it.

“Fine. I don’t care,” he spat out and left the car.

Hardly anyone was there that early. He was glad to be in the space before the school was filled with distracted and vapid people. He’d already swore to put Poe out of his mind as he climbed the front steps and made his way to their wing of the school. The corridors were broad but would feel smaller in only a half an hour. He preferred to not feel trapped. He could make it through the entire day not feeling like he was drowning if he could just forget Poe Dameron and whatever lie he was going to tell him now.

And of course he was there.

Poe lifted his head as he heard him take even steps down the corridor. He paused, exhaled, and kept walking. Ignoring him now would be the best idea right then.

“Hey,” he said, standing. “I told you I’d be here.”

“Yeah, you did.” He didn’t want to look at him. It was all a game. It was all to get him into some sort of prank or something that would end in hurt. “What are you doing here?”

Poe scoffed and took a step back. That’s when Kylo finally looked at him. Poe’s tongue nervously ran up and down a split lip that was still bright red and fresh. A dull mark shone out to him from under his left eye. Kylo was shaken into curiosity, finally stopping to really study him and the injuries.

“Yeah, I couldn’t be there and I feel like shit. I got…it was like this, some idiot left a freezer door open when I was trying to restock some stuff. I walked into it. I had to go to the hospital and my parents were pissed. I wanted to come. I really wanted to. How was it?” Poe was trying to distract him and he couldn’t buy into it.

“It was okay. Paige made a game. I hated it.” He held back: _I don’t believe you_.

He watched as Poe looked down and then back up at him again. “Yeah, you would. But really, I hope you’re not mad.”

He was. He was furious. But his eyes could only focus on the wound on Poe’s face. Letting his eye close in on him, he finally nodded. Rey might have been right. She was usually right.

“I’ll see you in class,” he mumbled as he grabbed his first-period books.

“Okay,” Poe said, still looking at him. “See you later.”

 

-=-

 

He just wanted to go home. There was nothing left for him there today. There would have to be a tomorrow but it would still be horrible. Music helped. People weren’t helping right now. The last week had been too many words and feelings and he wanted nothing but emptiness.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught heads turning and mouths opening to yell. Over the shrill tones of his music, he slowly turned his head. It only took the brief glance to make his shoulders straighten; he was snapped out of his numbness. Bryce had Poe pinned up against a locker, spitting words at him that he couldn’t hear. Poe was nattering back, just as quickly, pushing at the other boy’s hands to let him go. It had only been a week since his birthday, but it had been hard for him to forgive Poe instantly. He was working on it, mostly filling up pages in one of his journals.

It was easy to forgive someone when they were being threatened.

With quick hands, he yanked down his headphones. “Hey!”

Bryce’s blond head snapped towards him. “Fuck off, faggot.”

His shoulders firmed and he narrowed his eyes. He was moving without thinking and pushed the senior off of his friend. It was a flurry of hands and clumsiness, mostly on the other boy’s part. Poe was talking, but he only heard dull noises around him. He knew that the others were yelling, but they blurred out.

He only saw the fight that he was in.

It had been too long.

He breathed it in and locked eyes with the dumber, but bigger, boy. He still felt like a kid, but Bryce was graduating that spring; he was an adult. He shouldn’t be going after his friend. It made his hands twitch and his blood start to run hot. Everything started to blur out and the space turned dark. Red tinged on the corner of his eyes and he almost grinned. He saw fear in Bryce’s eyes and he had his moment to strike.

Gripping Bryce’s shirt, he shoved him hard against the locker. Bryce was taller and bigger, but he didn’t see any of that as he glared at him. Bryce pushed back, trying to punch him.

Kylo just smirked to himself and stepped out of his reach. Bryce’s face was red as his hands tried to grab at him, to push him down, to get him on the ground. He’d seen how the other boy fought. He knew he’d stumble and wasn’t certain of his own body.

It only took two steps to grab him and smash his face against the locker.

Kylo only had to use one hand, but he could hear the other boy cry out as his nose met hard metal with a wet crunch. He grabbed him again and saw blood and heard screams. Once more he brought flesh against the unforgiving surface.

A firm hand gripped his arm and he stepped away, leaving Bryce to fall to the ground, grabbing at his nose.

Holdo stood there. He’d heard her voice earlier, but it hadn’t mattered.

She was talking but he didn’t hear her.

As the world faded back into focus, he saw the panic on Poe’s face. He caught a look from Paige over his shoulder, her hands covering her mouth. Liza was holding her books against her chest, her mouth agape. The rest of the students were just blurred faces in a crowd around them.

“Ben, stop.” The principal's voice was firm. “What happened?”

He dropped his head and didn’t have an answer.

 

-=-

 

Poe wouldn’t stop taking his fries. He’d finally been able to go off of school grounds for lunch after the two weeks of ‘detention’, and that bastard kept taking his food.

“No, you’re wrong. How are you guys ahead of me? It’s like this, symbolism is everything in English,” Poe started to lecture Liza and Paige, across them in the booth. His plate was still half full, most of his fries drowned in ketchup. But he wouldn’t stop taking his fries from Kylo’s plate.

Annoyed, Kylo shoved a handful of what was left into his mouth. He still wasn’t listening to a lecture from a freshman, but he had been forced to eat the rest of his lunch. Poe caught his annoyed glare and smirked, leaning in closer to try to grab another one. He felt his leg press against his as he tried to reach passed him to get at his food.

The girls giggled.

The soft music in the diner filtered through his ears. The leather of the booth squeaked as Poe shifted his weight, intending to strike again at the remains of his lunch. Kylo sat back, letting Poe take a fry. He folded his arms behind his head, grinning at his stolen victory. His lip had healed long ago, but when he smiled, Kylo could still catch the hint of it.

Even when things were normal, he’d always be reminded of the darkness that most people hid. He wrapped himself in his, bearing its heavy weight in everything that he did.

But for a few minutes, he felt it lift. He was in high school, with friends. He was finally allowed to go out to eat wherever he wanted.

Things were almost how they were supposed to be.

 


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm almost caught up on work, guys. i still have so much proofreading and research and teaching ahead of me but...here we are. thanks sooo much for the comments and kudos - you guys don't know how much they mean to me. we're back on board the pain train for this chapter and then the next. we're finally catching up to nearly 50+ pages that i have written for this. it's all downhill from here, fam. Please excuse the typos, I'm really tired but I'll go back and fix them at some point I promise!

 

If Rey weren’t Rey, she would have almost forgotten what it was like when Kylo had a bad day. Rose didn’t understand when Paige had a bad day; she’d just whine that her sister didn’t want to play with her. But to Rey, she called them bad days, but the word didn’t really match some of the times that she’d seen or felt the last almost two years. Colours were deeper than words; they filled her head the moment she stepped back into the house and the world swirled with tones of red and black.

She had spent the weekend at grandma’s. She’d been sick for their birthday and Leia had promised her a sleepover when they had a free day from school. A long weekend usually meant being bored, wanting to do more homework or play more games or do anything. But a weekend with grandma would mean different and new things. It would mean being away from Kylo, but he had been having a good week so she thought he could have some time to himself too to spend alone with his friends. That was a good enough present for Rey, to give him the space that he wanted.

When she was about to leave with Han on Friday afternoon, Kylo had been smirking on his phone. He was sitting on the couch rather than hiding in his room. His feet were on the coffee table and he was stretched out, letting himself almost hang off the sofa. He wasn’t wearing black for once; he was wearing a blue shirt; it rid up his back, showing off his sides as he rolled over. He shifted easily over to the couch as Rey watched him from the doorway. Han just let her watch him. He was watching him too.

It had been a week filled with Kylo smiling and hope fluttered in shimmering butterflies across her eyes before she left.

Sometimes time felt jumbled to Rey. Things smashed into other things. Sometimes she’d be at school and then she’d be at home with Kylo. Sometimes she’d be with Rose and Finn on the playground, and then back at Snoke’s. Driving with Han the few hours it took to grandma’s, she let the feelings overlap until the days were all the same. It was like going outside of her body; she could go outside of time too. Maz told her not to do that, but sometimes it was too tempting to escape.

Rey knew he’d been in a fight in school a couple of weeks ago and it had made her upset. She had cried and pouted at him, having trouble understanding why he always went back to old habits, no matter how much they hurt her. She never wanted to be disappointed in him, but she hated seeing Han and Leia have to deal with punishing him. They didn’t like it because they didn’t want to lose him; they would go over the countless books and papers, trying to come up with the right way for Kylo to deal with what had happened, but also still feel safe and trust them. Rey didn’t always agree with them. She thought the rules were a little silly because Kylo knew right from wrong. But her faith in him had been shaken by how he’d started lying about how he felt on her birthday, keeping things from her. He’d made it up to her and told her everything that night, and it was clear he felt bad about hiding himself from her on such a special day.

She still didn’t understand why birthdays were special, but guessed that she’d start believing it the next year and it would be the new truth.

He had promised her with sincerity that he wasn’t just acting out at school to hurt someone just to feel something. He was defending his friend. It was the right thing to do, even though it was wrong. She had seen panic in his eyes as he told her that and he quickly added that he probably should have tried to talk the other boy out of the fight. That part made Rey smile and told him that she never wanted to hurt anyone either, but if someone was hurting her friends, she would have to really think about it.

But he took his two-week punishment—no car until detention was over—and didn’t complain. He’d mope, sure, lying on her bed as she did her homework on the floor, and stare at her out of boredom. He just wanted to spend time with her, he said. And she believed him.

And then he just seemed to turn it around, to force himself to not stand so straight and gaze off into nothing.

They drove in his car; it wasn’t a new car, but it was just used and he liked it. He didn’t want anything new. Or at least he didn’t need anything new. And even though Han was there, she was so happy to be the first person that Kylo drove with on his own. She wanted to reach for his hand but remembered to sit back and hold her seatbelt. They didn’t have to go anywhere, they just had to drive.

It was like the stories he’d tell when she was even smaller. How good freedom would feel when they could decide for themselves. On some of his darker days, he’d hold her and talk about how good it would be just to leave and forget everyone there. After grandpa died and Hux left, that’s when those conversations were the worst.

Now he had access to that freedom. And he could go anywhere and leave her behind forever.

Was there really a forever? When the thought struck her in Kylo’s car, Han was pointing out something in the distance and Kylo was following his hand to squint through the spring sunlight.

With his features washed out, he was back to looking softer and younger. It was suddenly the same face that would lull her to sleep with fantastic stories of hope or just simple touches that told her that he cared. Even when he was hurt and broken, bleeding and holding back tears to not draw attention to them, he would put his heart out to her to keep her safe. The times that he was truly blinded by agony were the times that she’d been hurt. When Snoke would lock him in the closet and force him to hear her scream.

He’d do that to force Kylo to do the really bad things. The things that made him cry and scream now when he thought she couldn’t hear him.

There were ways that Kylo had been hurt that she thought she understood because she felt them too. She’d been there, in the same place. The memories were getting distant but the pain still cut through her when she dreamed and when she was tired and couldn’t keep the darkness away. Still, she’d never be able to really forget them or let them go. Dead hearts followed her everywhere, memories of faces no one would ever see again. But now that he was thinking differently, being more adult, she wasn’t sure that they felt the same way anymore.

Then he had a good week. He wanted to drive to school, but still rode with her in mom’s car: that made her stomach buzz with happiness. He’d smile at her and was happy again when she got home from school. He was texting more, actually using his phone rather than letting it sit forgotten on his bed as it buzzed for hours. He’d go out, spend time with his friends. He’d go to practice and come home and show her some move he’d perfected. The final tournament before state was coming and he really felt ready. Poe hung out at their place, doing homework and playing video games after practice and after Kylo showered. When they were alone, just her and Poe, he’d ask her what she liked and what she liked the most about school. He’d give her a big hug every time that she saw him, lifting her up into his arms. He was smaller than Kylo but his energy would make up for the height.

She felt like she could leave him. She wanted to be a little selfish, and also spend time with grandma. Grandma meant flowers and pictures of kittens. Grandma meant a new sweater and watching the fish in the aquarium. They lived their whole lives not knowing there was someone taking care of them. She’d watch the smaller, bright blue ones follow her fingers as she made them dance from outside the tank. They were hungry but only knew that she was a blur that meant food.

She left on Friday and was back late on Sunday.

And Kylo was having a bad day that sucked the happy stories she had brought with her. It had taken only a weekend and he had just vanished into himself. Had there been another fight at practice? No, he wasn’t in trouble. Did he lose a friend? No, Leia said. Poe had spent the night on Saturday and it had been a nice and normal evening.

But Sunday morning, after he’d left, Kylo just decided that nothing was right anymore.

He’d screamed at his mother, not holding anything back. Leia just stared at the kitchen island, telling her the truth because that’s what she asked for. She needed to figure it out, to unravel what happened. The world was unfair and he was never going to be happy and normal. Nothing was ever going to be right. Then he locked himself in his room and wouldn’t answer to anyone.

Not even Rey when she got home and carefully knocked on the door, tapping out her usual pattern of love and hope.

He didn’t answer.

“Kylo? Are you okay?” She asked, her voice as tiny as she could make it so it would slip under the door.

Finally, after too many minutes, she heard him settle on the other side of the door. He tapped his response. _Died a long time ago._

“But that wasn’t this you. That was the other you.” She could hear Han and Leia standing at the bottom of the stairs, still talking and filled with worry. “I saved you, ‘member.”

_Can’t I just have a bad day?_

The taps were slow, like his hands were having a hard time keeping still enough to make sense.

“Everyone can have a bad day. Even you,” she tried to sound more adult, more like a teenager or something. It didn’t fit right in her mouth. She was still just a kid, too small in the big world to lift him up anymore. “Can I come in? I’m really tired.”

She heard him stand up and open the door. His eyes were red and his face was pale. He looked down at where she was crouched and then slowly turned away to move towards the bed.

 _What happened?_ She blinked as she closed the door.

He blinked rapidly in return. _Nothing happened. I got too happy and I think I broke._

 _Broke?_ He wasn’t broken. Nothing could break Kylo.

He pulled the sleeves on his sweater down rolling the cuffs over his hands. _Just broke._

Rey rubbed at her eyes and stepped towards the bed. He didn’t pull away, but he didn’t reach for her either. He crossed his arms and leaned forward, dropping his head against his folded arms.

His phone buzzed and he ignored it. She frowned at him and reached for it, small thumbs typing in his code.

_R U ok?_

“Don’t tell him I’m upset,” Kylo mumbled. “I just haven’t answered him.”

Rey quickly scrolled through the other messages. Other than the thirty unanswered texts, everything before that looked normal. Stupid messages from Poe, serious answers from Kylo. Talking about rooming together one last time and how next season would be better.

Frowning, Rey typed a response. _Rey just got home. Was asleep. Down day._

The reply came instantly. _K. Give her a hug from me. Seeya tomorrow._

“Did something happen?” She asked, setting the phone back down on the nightstand. “Are you mad at him?”

“Nothing happened.” He sat up and looked at her. “We hung out. He complained about having to have a job because his dad is a piece of shit. He doesn’t even have a bed at home, Rey. It’s so unfair that we have so much and he’s…working while we just…get to be kids again.”

She quirked her head. Even though she understood, she needed him to answer. No more lies. “That made you mad?”

“Of course it made me mad! A guy jumped him at school for no reason. Rey, what if I didn’t want to be his friend? Who would have stood up for him?” Kylo was keeping his voice low but in her head, she heard him yelling, screaming it into the void.

She escaped into it, tuning out the room and putting them there, in that space. It wasn’t Snoke’s basement; it was a place in between escape and reality. It made her feel safe and she could only see him.

“Someone would have,” she said, stepping closer. “Kids aren’t always mean.”

He shook his head. “High school is mean, Rey. It will be different for you because you’re nice and by then, you’ll be even nicer. And you’ll be pretty. That will help.”

“Kylo, do you think I’m pretty now?”

Even as the reds and blacks swirled around him, he smirked at her. His face softened and he finally stopped to look at her with real eyes, not the fake ones that he sometimes wore. “You’re beautiful. Rey, I want you to grow up and not have to deal with all this. I’m ruining it.”

She forced herself out of her head, to be back with him in the room. “I love you. No matter what.”

He closed his eyes and sighed. “Love you too. I should…go downstairs and apologize, right?”

“Only if you mean it,” Rey’s voice was firm. “Please, Kylo. Say the real words.”

“Yeah.” He shook his head, still playing with the sleeves of his sweater. “I get mad and just…forget that I’m allowed to be happy.”

Kylo reached out and took her hand and she squeezed it, smiling.

He dropped his head and left his room. She waited until she heard the voices fading into the kitchen to grab his phone.

“Hey, Ky, what’s up?” Poe’s voice was sleepy, but he answered after three rings.

“It’s Rey,” she said, keeping her voice quiet.

“Hey sweet pea, how was your grandma’s?”

“It was good. Is Kylo mad at you?” She felt dumb asking it, but Kylo’s lies from before wouldn’t leave her.

“Don’t think he is. I was bugging him about Paige and how she likes him but won’t say it. How Liza is a total bitch for not leaving him alone. He got quiet so I stopped. Nothing big. No fights. He seemed, like, happy when I left. It’s nice to see him like that, you know?” Poe was sitting up and seemed to have left the room to go outside. She could hear the sound of wind chimes and tried to put herself there. It was easier to talk on the phone if she knew where a person was. “Do you think he’s worried that I won’t be his friend anymore after the next road trip? Is that why he’s…whatever…sad?”

Boys didn’t like talking about feelings. But Kylo and Poe were all about feelings.

“What do you mean?” If there hadn’t been an argument, then Kylo had gone into fantasy, building up something that wasn’t really there. It was like Snoke’s shadow in the hallways at school; no one else could see it, but it was still real to her. Kylo’s fantasies were true to him too.

“He’s probably worried that we won’t be friends anymore after the next road tip. He should go to state and probably will but there’s no way I’m getting to state.” Poe said, and she could hear the grin in his voice.

“Why not?” She was smiling at the phone, comfortable in Kylo’s with nothing but the contact and the conversation. “You’re good too, right?”

He laughed. “Nope. I’m fucking awful.”

“I think he…made up something bad in his head. It made him sad.” She knew that Kylo wouldn’t talk forever downstairs. She had to be quicker.

“Okay, yeah. I’ll…look I’ve got work all this week to even have enough money to go on this trip. Make sure he knows I’m not ditching him on purpose or anything.” She thought Poe could hear the panic in her voice, despite how she tried to hold it back. “Tell him goodnight for me, okay?”

“Okay. Bye.”

She hung up and put the phone back where it was.

She heard the shower running shortly after.

So she quickly went downstairs to see how mom and dad were doing.

She already knew they’d let her miss school the next day.

 

-=-

 

Poe was supposed to come over for dinner the night before leaving for the tournament.

He was late.

The hours dragged on and on and Rey was tired of everyone else waiting like he wasn’t coming.

Kylo had been pacing around, glaring at the walls, until he finally met her eyes and he nodded and knew that he should put his energy into something else.

She knew he’d be there. When she heard his shoes on the porch, she ran to meet him at the back door. Kylo was already up in his room, writing in his journal instead of impatiently scowling at everything. He was more or less back to normal now, the maelstrom of Sunday forgotten. Monday had been a quiet day spent on the couch, eating snacks and not doing anything. Mom and dad took the day off work, but stayed away unless they needed something. There was no feelings chart. There were no long conversations. They were just a family.

“This is the good door,” she smiled. “This door is for our real friends.”

He dipped his head and stepped inside. “Yeah, Ky told me. Hey, I forgot my backpack. We’ll need to get it tomorrow morning. I’ve got all my stuff there…and I forgot it. Like a fucking dumbass.”

Rey was used to hearing Kylo sound sad and angry at himself, but most other people kept their pain from her. Not Poe, though. Normally, he would drown it out by talking too much. He gave so much away in his silences. He was sitting in their back entrance; he’d flopped down and closed the door behind him with his foot. Lumpy came down to investigate, and was looking down at them from the kitchen. Poe was touching his arms, looking like it had been too cold to be without a jacket. With a firm frown, Rey shook her head. They weren’t her real mom and dad, but mom and dad still made sure that she went anywhere with what she needed. She grabbed one of Han’s old fleeces from the hook and handed it to him. It wasn’t the one he used to walk the dog on cold mornings, but the one that he’d promised to give away to charity but never did.

“We have too much,” she said. “It’s okay.”

“No, I…” Poe started and then stopped. He looked smaller, more like another kid, as they sat in the back entrance. He still pulled on the oversized sweater and then frowned. “Is he mad?”

Rey matched his look. “Why would he be mad?” They’d talked about this. Kylo was looking forward to going away.

She reached for Poe’s hand, forcing him from the floor and into the light of the kitchen. He gave Lumpy a nice and thorough pet and greeting. That’s when Rey noticed the bruise under Poe’s eye. It was small and would fade quickly, but it was still there; it looked like everything that she’d seen before on her own body. The tiny marks that other people thought they could hide on others. The echoes of death drew her down as she watched him move, suddenly worried about what he could and couldn’t do. It was making her body hurt with thoughts. He was taller and she couldn’t take care of him.

Rey opened the fridge to distract herself. “Your plate is here, we saved it for you.”

“Thanks, sweet pea, I’m….” he trailed off. He looked around the empty kitchen and bit his lip. “Hey, why are you guys so nice to me?”

She smirked and shrugged. “Kylo is your best friend. I want to help him stay that way.”

Poe had to help her put the plate in the microwave and waited patiently as her hands, which were still too tiny and weak, to grate more cheese on top once it was warm.

He was Kylo’s best friend. She had to take care of him, no matter how small she was.

He ate with only a fork, which was weird to Rey since he always ate normally at dinners before, as a slow stream of adults filled their space: which was even weirder, since there were only two of them. They were pretending not to listen, but they were. Han came down first, mumbling something about resetting the Wi-Fi because nothing was working like it should. He only looked at Poe and nodded before fiddling with the small white box at the top of the pantry. Leia trailed after him when he started swearing at the modem. Poe could only look at her and grin as he ate the last of his lasagne.

Leaning her head against her hand, she smiled. He looked so happy to be there, despite her fake-but-still-real parents bickering in the background, down the steps towards the basement where the other box was. She knew how to fix it but didn’t say anything. Kylo had already said that it shouldn’t be there.

“I helped make it.” Rey felt like she was boasting, but she wasn’t. “I cut the onions and fried them. And then I did the hamburger meat and put in the spices. We followed all the steps. It goes sauce, cheese, then the noodles, then the meat. I might have messed up some of the layers, but everybody said it was good. Even Kylo.”

“It’s good. Do you like cooking?” He looked tired and the usual smile in his voice was hidden behind a wall that she’d only rarely felt from him before.

When he’d finished, he reached out to her and she took his hand maybe too quickly. He hadn’t even asked for something to drink. And they had milk.

“He’s writing something,” Rey said, trying to make it not sound like an excuse. “He’s been…he was waiting for you but couldn’t wait anymore.”

Poe looked from his empty plate back to her. “I get it, yeah. He’s probably worried about tomorrow too. He’ll do good. I’m going to fucking suck, like always.”

His head snapped up as Leia climbed the stairs from the basement. “You can swear, sweetheart. And you’re probably not as awful as you think.”

“No, I’m really bad. I’d quit if I could, but then Ky would think it’s something personal and not talk to me for a month.” Poe was smiling but Rey knew that it wasn’t a real joke.

Leia shook her head and took his plate. Rey jolted, realizing that it was something she should have done. But Leia just shook her head and put the empty dish and fork in the dishwasher. “He let’s you call him that?”

Poe shrugged. “He doesn’t argue about it. I guess.”

Finally, she heard Kylo’s feet on the stairs. He looked at them both and his reaction was clear to her but probably hidden for everyone else. He was both pleased that his friend was there, but also satisfied that he had been able to wait without bothering anyone. Not saying anything, he sat down beside her and nodded, mostly to himself.

“You didn’t have to walk here,” he said at last.

Poe tried to shrug off the comment, especially with Leia standing there. “Nah, I took the bus most of the way. It’s really fine, Mrs Solo. You feed me and let me hang out here. He’s worried about nothing.”

Rey knew why it bothered Kylo so much. Going anywhere, meeting strangers along the way, was something he didn’t want anyone to do alone. He thought he was fine on his own and he could defend himself now. Others who were smaller or weaker, however, he’d focus on how many things could go wrong. The first time that she took Lumpy for a walk on her own, he looked at her with quiet betrayal that she put herself in any sort of danger. It was just to the corner and back. And she knew that mom was watching her the entire time. It was like Kylo didn’t trust anyone but himself, still.

And it was frustrating.

But she could deal with it. For him.

 


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: READ THE CHAPTER NOTES FOR WARNINGS.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for the comments and kudos so far. This chapter has given me anxiety about posting it. Again, check the End Notes for the warnings (since they're a bit spoilery, I put them at the end).

 

Kylo wasn’t mad about losing. He could deal with that. It was the bitter atmosphere in the van that made him seethe. He’d pushed those negative emotions out of his head in between this trip and the last; there had been so much that had happened in between and now it meant nothing. He’d lost and everyone was disappointed in him. The season was over and he’d been dominated, getting bad draw after bad draw, hardly scoring points and getting pinned because he wasn’t focused. Getting to the hotel, he didn’t even wait for the others. Storming off, he kicked hard at a crushed coke can across the parking lot. He was lucky even to be allowed on the trip after what happened at school, but he might as well hadn’t gone at all.

Taking angry and deep breaths, he looked up at the sky and swore under his breath. The others were watching him but he didn’t care. They were the problem for never listening to him.

He heard shuffling feet and turned to see Poe, holding both of their bags. He could go from looking cocky to pouting in an instant. During the last few weeks, his first impressions had been inverted, but they still remained in the back of his mind like a reminder of how people treated him in the beginning. He probably cared too much. In his heated anger, he thought that he should just stop caring about him once and for all. To stop coming by his house and being around him, since he was such a loser who couldn’t do anything that made him into a real person. He caught a glimpse of the rest of the team glaring at him in the distance and snorted.

“You can go for a walk. Coach says it’s okay.” His expression showed concern and he knew that his friend was worried about him. Still, he wouldn’t say it when others—especially the team—could hear it. “We’re in room 204.”

Poe looked at him for long enough to make him take a warning step forward. Finally turning towards the hotel, Kylo waiting until he was inside before sitting down on the low concrete traffic barrier. The chill of the late April evening started to settle against his bare arms and he shuddered. Normally, being alone was enough to calm him down. He would be able to think clearly, going over why everyone was wrong. Most often, he’d call Rey. He checked his phone and his annoyance spiked at the time. Leia wouldn’t let her talk this late. There was always someone in his way. Even if she didn’t have school the next day, there would be some dumb thing they were forcing her to do. They were still trying to get her to decide whether she liked gymnastics or dancing. She liked both and didn’t see why she couldn’t do both. His parents didn’t understand that Rey wanted to do everything.

He heard the gravel rustle and quickly looked up. It was just a man standing outside the hotel, smoking.

Poe had worn him down. He actually missed him and his never-ending chatter. Poe, being over excited over an easy win. Poe, trying to cheer him up when he wanted to feel empty. Poe, who wouldn’t bug him to eat, but would instead steal his food until he was forced to do something about it.

Stamping his foot in the dirt, he forced himself to stand.

God damn him.

He had to knock on the door and was forced to wait five minutes before Poe answered. He had a towel on his head.

“I’m sorry, I was in the shower. Do you have my room service?”

“Shut the fuck up,” he countered, pushing by him. He sat down heavily on his bed, taking off his shoes and tossing them into the corner. Poe was busy rehanging the towel, still chucking to himself about his joke.

“It wasn’t your fault, you know. You got a bad draw, a couple of them,” Poe said, scratching his head. “And it’s also not your fault that our school sucks so hard.”

“I don’t hate school. I hate the people there.” He settled against the headboard of the hard hotel bed. It wasn’t anything that he hadn’t heard before. Poe sat next to him and pursed his lips and then nodded a little. The television looked dusty, showing their distorted reflection back at him.

He was starting to regret coming back at all if Poe was just going to try to cheer him up the entire time. Instead, his companion fell quiet. It was easier to accept how close he was sitting if he was silent. There was no quick quip or annoying response. He let him have his silence.

And he wasn’t alone in it.

They’d had these moments before. He shouldn’t be surprised by them anymore, but his mind was too full to find familiarity in its clear form. But this was the last road trip of the season with state now out of sight. They were friends now, but Kylo was expecting the trust that he’d put in him to evaporate with the season over. Promises could be broken and they probably would.

Rey was right. This had why he had been thrown into rage. This was probably going to end tonight and it had been building in his mind since then.

Exhaling, Poe pulled his legs up and settled his chin on his knees. He was shorter and always tried to make up for it by taking on larger kids. That explained the fight with Bryce. Kylo was embracing being taller than most of the other boys at school, even the seniors. It was just aggravating not being stronger than most of them.

“I wish we were in more of the same classes. But hey, things got better after you beat the shit out of that guy.” He grinned and then it faded away. “It still sucks that you got detention and he got nothing.”

“He got a broken nose,” he said. “And I’ll break it again.”

Thinking again about taking on the older boy, Kylo felt a spike of dark pride. He was careful to pick his battles and that had been one that he had taken on fully, accepting the consequences. The truth was still making his neck itch. After the constant fights and scuffles when he started school again almost two years ago, most of them caused by his misunderstanding something or the need to quell his constant craving for aggression, the school finally comprehended that he didn’t react to having privileges taken away. Holdo instead had made him write out and describe the events, rewriting them until he could fully explain the emotions behind them. He’d sit in her office, going over the texts until he felt calm. Since then, instead of starting a fight, he mostly stuck to writing out elaborate scenarios from both his perspective, and whoever had angered him. The wrestling team helped even more.

He only made a few exceptions. That asshole had been one of them. Poe had gotten himself into that mess but there was no way, as long as he was breathing, that one of his friends was going to be hurt. Rey understood that and her caring had made it easier to wait to get his car and freedom again. And then he screwed it all up by not being able to deal with his apprehensive fear. Taking a quick glance, he caught Poe’s eyes. There had been so much writing and it was only when he stopped that the thoughts got stuck in his head.

He didn’t tell Poe that he had also started a new notebook. About him.

“Everyone says that you’re hard to talk to, but they’re totally wrong. I mean, at first, I didn’t think I’d get you to talk to me, but now I’m glad I did. You talk when you need to. You don’t just talk to hear yourself speak.” Poe was looking at him intently, like he was disclosing something that he didn’t already know.

“You mean I’m not like you,” he answered flatly, before smirking.

“You’re an asshole, fuck you.” Poe shoved him, grinning wildly. “Are you…are you going to go to that spring dance thing? We can hang out instead if you’re not going.”

He rolled his eyes. Poe was just like him, asking questions that he already knew the answers to. Still, he gave into it. “Liza keeps asking me. I told her that I’d go only if I could go with Paige and _she_ went with someone else. You take Liza if you want. Hux would hate it.”

Just saying his former friend’s name made him shudder as he tried to block the pang of emotion from fully coming through.

“But you wouldn’t care?” Poe answered. “I mean, she’s cute. Not my type, but cute. Still a total bitch to you and me, so she’ll just say no and do that nose thing she does. The pig nose.”

He almost laughed at the impression. But he kept his face neutral, only briefly closing his eyes.

“You’re around her enough. She keeps trying to touch me even though she knows I hate it.” He lifted his shoulders. “She wants to be my girlfriend. She doesn’t ask about it anymore, but she talks to Paige about it. Paige feels bad and tells me. I try not to think about it.”

“You don’t like her?”

They’d had this conversation before. The one that made him shut down. He wanted to keep talking this time, to not hold back. The last week had been climbing over humps in his head, to understand when he should and shouldn’t give into other people’s concerns. Rey was right.

“She’s an okay friend, I guess. A half friend. She…sometimes she talks too much but when she actually listens, it’s something I like. She’s always happy in the morning, happy to see me. Since Hux ditched me, she’s usually the first person to meet me at school. Well, before I started hanging out with you. But I know what she’s doing. So it’s easier to keep saying I don’t want a girlfriend. I’d rather be alone, but my parents and Rey would be worried. Rey is friends with Paige’s sister. We hang out more with them and Liza is just…there. It’s gotten easier to avoid her since we became friends.”

Poe put his head down for a moment, then stretched out his legs. There was another hole in one of his socks. Poe caught him looking and quickly pulled off the offending articles of clothing and tossed them aside. He wiggled his toes for a moment, taunting him. His smile slowly faded, however, and he looked at him quickly before turning away.

“Why would you stay friends with her if she kissed you without asking? Without giving you the chance to say no, back off. This has been bothering me for a while,” Poe’s voice turned bitter, his eyes fixed on the opposite wall. “I would have ditched her after that. So hard. I might have even spread nasty rumours about her too and then felt bad about doing it. She stole something from you and wanted to get into your pants and wouldn’t even let you say no.”

“I don’t know.” He shook his head. “It was just something that happened. I’m not as mad anymore.”

“But you’re still mad?”

He let his head drop. “You saw me tonight. You know what happened last week. I’m mad about everything.”

“You’re not…I mean, yeah I guess you are. But it’s not your fault. I don’t want to repeat myself, but I’m so right about this. What happened to you was fucked up, especially if you can’t really talk to anyone about it. And Hux’s dad is wrong. It was that crazy fucker who was a psycho. You’re just…I don’t know. It’s like you were spit out of a volcano and are still cooling off.” Poe’s eyes were darting around as he spoke, but finally fixed on his bare feet. “My dad just thinks you’re weird.”

“My dad…I finally made him happy when he taught me how to drive. Getting my license was the first real thing we could do together. I could have got a better car, if I had wanted one.” He sighed, remembering the look on Han’s face every time they were out in the car. He wasn’t really teaching him. He was just desperate to spend time with him. “Driving with him was…nice. And I didn’t even thank him.”

“Maybe your dad can teach me. My old man isn’t doing shit to help me.” Poe was still staring at his feet, his head lowered. “My mom keeps threatening to divorce him, every time he unloads on her or me. She packs a bag and leaves for a week, but always comes back. And I have to go to school with a busted lip and act like it never happened. No matter what I do, I’m a fuck up in his eyes.”

Wincing, Kylo nodded. “Is that why he made you change schools?”

Poe shrugged, but then finally shook his head in agreement. He leaned closer, brushing his shoulder, then pulled away. He was acting normal tonight, but for Poe normal meant weird. “He didn’t like the people I was hanging out with. That and rent was ‘too fucking expensive’ at our old place. Now we just live in a cheaper, shittier dump. He never throws anything out. I think we have like fourteen broken vacuum cleaners in the garage. Why did he fucking bring those? I had to throw out a bunch of my shit and he brought the fucking vacuum cleaners.”

Poe was trying to make a joke, but he couldn’t let the moment escape him. His eyes had been too quick in the shower earlier and he couldn’t forget the pain that was clearly inflicted on his friend from someone older and stronger. Vengeance was all that Kylo wanted. He could never have it fully, but for someone else then maybe he could find an end.

“I’ve seen the bruises,” Kylo said, killing the long pause that had filled the room. The lights were buzzing, but Kylo could only hear how they were breathing. The lingering mark under Poe’s eye had made him nervous the entire time they’d been together. He finally sucked in another breath to speak, even though he was unsure of what to say. “Was that him?”

A rising anger had taken hold of him then, remembering how Poe had moved gingerly and at half-speed during practice weeks ago, then stepped off the mat entirely. He claimed he hurt his ankle. But he’d been hurt _again_. Taking the bus to his house and forgetting his things just made the thoughts lock into place.

“He got pissed when your mom called a while ago and he realized that he’d have to stop wailing on my face. Still doesn’t stop him, and he forgets when he’s drunk. When he’s not, well…Stupid fucker doesn’t think that anyone will see me without my shirt off.” Poe suddenly laughed, then let his head sag back against the headboard. “Did you…see anything else?”

He raised an eyebrow in response. But his eyes had caught it, even if his mind hadn’t.

Slowly, the other boy lifted his shirt. The newer bruises had faded to a sickly green, but they were still there. Kylo had to lean forward to see what Poe was pointing at, but then he saw them. Fine and neat white lines traced along the side of his chest, along his ribs.

With a grim look on his face, Poe dropped his shirt. “I thought no one would notice them if I did it there. It sucks at the beach, but I just tell anyone that asks that it was a cat. I don’t even have a cat. Yeah, um…” There was a long pause as Poe fiddled with the hem of his shirt. There was a pain there that Kylo had only caught glimpses of before. If he hadn’t been so focused on his own docked agony, he might have been more aware. “Things got…bad for a while.”

Tracing the leather bracelet on his left hand, Kylo nodded. It was the one he’d received for his birthday, the one from Poe. Silently, he undid the clasp. His hands were trembling as he lifted his wrist. The newest cut was still scabbing over, but it matched the other dozen scars that stained his skin. This one had been deeper though, less diagonal and more…proper.

He’d promised himself never to do it at home, and he’d breached that perimeter with too much ease. It was something he could do again. Something that he wanted to do again, desperately. Now, stuck in this room, he wanted to flee into his misery, pressed on by revealing something he didn’t want to tell anyone, but still did.

He let his hand drop and moved to return his wrist to the comfort of the band. Poe’s hand stopped him.

“I want…I mean…maybe we can be the type of friends that talk about this stuff more often. We already do, but maybe more? I never told you before but I…I’m afraid too, about how I think.” His hand was warm, even though it was only a light touch.

Managing a nod, Kylo bit his lip. He could talk to Rey, she understood. But he was realizing that everything that was happening in his head was too much for her. He never wanted her to stop talking to him. He didn’t want to scare her either. He would always tell Hux the essence of his feelings and memories; but towards the end of their friendship, he pulled back even more. His other friends liked to pretend that nothing happened so they wouldn’t have to deal with it. Paige tried her best, but her strategy was to try to tell him what normal thoughts should be and how to get there. The therapists would try to get him to open up, but he was exhausted from the constant tricks.

There was space for him here.

“I think I’d like that.” He wasn’t sure he said the words, but they came out anyway.

“Really?” Poe quirked his mouth into a grin. “That’s greatness.”

“Not really. Not for you.” He managed to half smile in return, stealing some of Poe’s energy for his own. “You’ve heard my nightmares.”

“Yeah, I think you kicked me once,” Poe teased.

Kylo looked at him flatly. “You were on the other bed. I can’t kick that far.”

“You have really long legs! I swear. Or maybe I was walking by the bed. When I go for my night walks. The ones where I walk around the room and watch you sleeping.” Poe was smiling at him, the pain pushed away for now.

Shoving his friend, Kylo finally laughed. “If you were watching me sleep, you deserved to get kicked.”

Poe sat up on his knees to face him and pushed him back. “I have to watch you sleep so I can _avoid_ getting kicked.”

Despite how annoying the joke was, Kylo returned Poe’s grin with one of his own. He would have been totally exhausted if the quiet moments of the evening hadn’t snuck up on them. There would always be the fear of rejection and hurt keeping him from fully giving away his soul, but he could start here now, truly. The silence stretched on and he closed his eyes, finally glad that the screams now only haunted his dreams.

He felt Poe rest his hand on his shoulder and he opened his eyes, giving him a look of irritation. Poe licked his lips and flicked his eyes from his hand to his lips, then finally his eyes. He slowly pulled his hand away and sat up, but was still inching closer.

There was a nervous energy in his gaze that made him uneasy, but still curious. His friend’s brown eyes were warm but were also searching for a reaction. He leaned forward, putting a warm hand on his leg. Kylo couldn’t feel his own heartbeat; the steady thudding in his chest came directly from the palm resting on his thigh. The encounter with Liza flashed in his mind, keeping him locked in place as Poe gradually leaned forward. With his face only a breath away, he paused, waiting for him to pull away or hit him.

He didn’t.

“Can I….okay.” Poe whispered, then closed the gap between them to press their lips together.

It was a light kiss and he hardly felt the pressure. There was just the delicate and warm sensation of lips and the lingering scent of Poe’s cologne. His lips were still soft and a curl of hair brushed his forehead. Kylo felt Poe’s hand tighten against his leg, making him sit up and inhale through his nose. The noise made Poe lean back, instantly taking on a mask of anxiety.

“Was that…weird?”

It was a stupid question. But instead of saying anything, he reached out and pulled Poe back towards him, kissing him again. Kylo pressed hard, mashing their mouths together and yanking Poe closer to grip his back. But the warmth of the awkward kisses cracked memories that he had wanted to keep locked away. The physical contact made him actually react. He’d never thought that much about sex for a reason that he wanted to keep from his waking mind; it was an annoying background noise that the other boys were obsessed with. Them and Liza. But now, kissing Poe, his body was lifted into something akin to joy. He felt the other boy’s mouth open and he dipped his tongue inside. The sensation hit him instantly and he groaned, letting a need that he’d never felt before grip him.

Poe jerked back. “Is this…okay?”

The feeling was fleeting, broken by the question.

“Shut up,” he snapped, before shoving the other boy away. He put his head in his hands and pressed on his eyes, trying to will the warmth spreading up his body to stop. Poe scrambled away to the other side of the room. When Kylo looked up, he saw tears shining in the other boy’s expressive eyes.

“I didn’t mean…shit…I thought…” he rambled, glancing quickly at the door, knowing that he needed to run. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

Kylo moved off the bed and Poe tensed, backing into a corner. His hands were up defensively as Kylo moved closer.

He knew he looked angry because the feeling was the easiest thing to latch on to. Anger and fear. Anything that felt that good could never end the way that he wanted. He’d miss something or misunderstand something. He should hit Poe. He should scream at him never to come close to him again. To fuck off and die. He wanted to admonish him for opening the locked box of feelings he’d kept hidden away in the back of his mind. Sex was only punishment and it shouldn’t bring out any positive reactions. This was just the way that it had to be.

But the dejected look that rolled over Poe’s face made him lower his raised fist.

Maybe there was another way.

“Can I…” The question trailed off from Kylo’s weak mouth and he bit his lip, hard. As gently as he could, he reached out to brush his hand against Poe’s.

“What? Beat the shit out of me for being a queer?” Poe was frozen, turning to words to try to defend himself. He looked down at Kylo’s hand and then met his eyes again, bewilderment overtaking dread.

“No.” This time he took Poe’s hand and squeezed it lightly. It was a different feeling than training. There was a softness there now, one that took away his focus. He leaned closer, breathing in to try to get back to his thoughts.

“What’s…what are you doing?” Poe’s voice was confused and there were still edges of hurt and fear there.

He had only rotten instinct at that point. He so rarely trusted his body in situations that he didn’t control. His arms he could trust, his legs he could depend on; but the rest was a space in between. His body was the thing that could be broken, but would heal in all the wrong places. Snoke had taught him that. His mind was the thing that could never be beaten, but it couldn’t be trusted either. But the ultimate betrayer right now was his body.

Taking Poe’s hand, he set it on his hip. He kept his unsteady hand there and with both terror and want, he stepped closer.

Poe lifted his other hand. It was also shaking, but firmed as he rested it on his cheek. Kylo leaned into the touch, too afraid to turn away but also not knowing what to do next.

“I don’t know what’s happening,” he finally said. He was looking into Poe’s eyes and saw the same hint of hazel that swept through Rey’s.

He didn’t know which was more wrong, but he leaned down to press his lips against his friend’s and pulled him closer, suddenly aching for the contact that part of him also wanted to flee. He tried to deepen the kiss again, searching for the same sensation as before. It didn’t take him long to find it, elevated by the connection. Poe ran his hands through his hair. His short nails grazed against his scalp. He’d never realized that touches could mean more than just care or hate. The third emotion was making him hard, a feeling that normally caused him dread, but Poe’s tongue was in his mouth and he felt a hand caress the front of his jeans.

That made him pull back, sucking in a dull gasp.

“Shit, sorry,” Poe’s shaky hand again settled on his waist. “Tell me what to do. Just…tell me. Tell me what I did wrong so I can make it better.”

Kylo could only shake his head and motion towards the bed.

Licking his lips, his friend nodded, his eyes darting back and forth. “Yeah, yeah, okay.”

Poe guided him towards the bed, even though his legs felt too stubborn to move. He let himself be dumbly dragged to his bed. He sat on the edge and Poe, also not wanting to give up the contact, clasped his hand.

“Look, Ky, I really like you. I should have told you that before I did anything. I’m sorry, I fucked that up. I know you and I know…just shit. I’m so sorry. You don’t know how much I like you. I don’t have words for it. They just come out all jumbled. And I just kissed you and…” Poe took a deep breath when Kylo squeezed his hand, trying to tell him to calm down. “Do you like me back?”

He didn’t want the pause to drag on too long, but his thoughts weren’t coming into place. The room was louder now and he could hear Poe’s breathing over his own. The light was buzzing. Someone opened a door in the hallway and then slammed it shut. He couldn’t think over the noise. Still, in his confusion, his body was still humming. Torn between his two halves, he just put his head on Poe’s shoulder.

“Sorry, I was selfish. Are you okay?” Poe said as he rested his head against his in return. He dropped his voice into a whisper. They were alone, but the gentle tone of the other voice made him relax. It was only a fraction of his anxiety, but it was enough to get words out of his mouth.

“Why would you like me?” He sounded pathetic. He sounded needy, like Rey when she was tired and upset with him. Poe had delicate curls and a sweet smile. Meanwhile, he had awkward ears and a mop of hair, moles and scars. He was pale to the other boy’s natural toned skin. Poe was handsome. He was just tall and awkward, but most of all damaged. There was nothing perfect about him. But holding Poe’s hand and feeling of his leg against his made him feel an inch above nothing. Poe wasn’t fragile like Rey. He didn’t have to worry about hurting him. He tried to tell himself that as the other boy started to speak.

“It’s actually easy. You’re smart, you’re funny. When you smile, I mean, I can count how many times you’ve really smiled the last month on two hands, but when you do…I can’t stop thinking about you. The rest of the day, I’m lost. Cold-shower lost.” Poe paused, prying their hands apart, only to reach around to drape his arm around his back. He pulled him closer before pressing a light kiss on his forehead. This must be how Rey felt every night. There was someone who cared for him, holding and caring for him.

He pushed down his rising anger at himself and shook his head. “How can you feel that way? About me?”

“I just do, Ky.” Poe hugged him closer. “I just do.”

Poe had to know. The locked box had been opened and he couldn’t close it again without releasing some of the toxic memories inside.

“You can’t like me,” he finally said, pulling away, refusing to let the words spill out. He wanted to stand from the bed but Poe held firm, forcing him to sit down. Glaring at him, Kylo only saw acceptance when he sat back down. “You don’t know what happened to me. Most of those things in the book and the documentaries were wrong because they didn’t go far enough. I’m too fucked up. You need to stop liking me. I’m telling you, right now, just stop it.”

“Tell me.” Poe looked at him defiantly. “I’m here. And I want to know. Ky, I won’t judge you. I just want to know what happened. You can’t just keep all of this in your head forever and come out the other side being normal.”

The word made him drop his head. That was all he wanted at this point. But it was something that he could never be.

Carefully, Poe leaned forward to kiss him again. Like the first time, it was warm and enticing. But, most of all, gentle.

Pulling away, Poe gestured towards the bed. Kylo hesitated before crawling up beside him. Resting his head against the younger boy’s chest, Kylo just shook his head. Their legs were mismatched in length when Kylo sought out somewhere else to look. He should have also said how awkward he was and how they didn’t match physically. But then he realized he was just trying to distract himself. There was someone here who wanted to listen, who might be able to understand—someone who wasn’t six years old who he didn’t want to destroy with the darkness inside him.

“I don’t want anyone to know.”

Poe hugged him. It was a gesture that he had avoided for so long, but now accepted. “Well, I’m not just anyone.”

Sucking in a dry breath, Kylo set his head down and started talking in a low voice. “I was seven when he took me. I didn’t know what was happening. It was exciting at first, like running away. It was something I always thought about. You know, just leaving everything that’s annoying you and everyone who’s ignoring you? Then he killed someone right in front of me. I knew what death was, but I didn’t think that it was real. This wasn’t like a movie. The boy who died, he was bleeding and crying and he did it to save me. I didn’t want to be there anymore, locked in that weird house. But I couldn’t get away. I never thought that a room could make you afraid before. I was just a kid and I knew he wanted to kill me. But he wanted something else too.” He was determined to say everything without stopping, and he had to fight through the cracks in his voice. He couldn’t cry. Poe couldn’t see him cry. “There was still a dying body on the floor. It smelled like…like dry leaves. I could feel the other kids watching me. They weren’t crying. I couldn’t figure out why they weren’t afraid too. He had _made_ me stab him. He put the knife in my hand and he was still warm. It was so…soft. Smooth. He was so…warm. His eyes were open. He was watching me stab him.

“Then I remember footsteps. And he closed the door to the upstairs. There were so many doors and all of them were awful, but just not broken enough. The other kids had run away. Snoke…I wasn’t afraid of him until I really looked at him. The other kids hadn’t been crying so I thought still, like a moron, that all of it could have been something fake and not real. But then I looked at him and realized I would never get out of there alive. His teeth were rotten. It was like he didn’t have lips and his skin was melted. I can still see every wrinkle, every line, when I close my eyes. When he looked at me, I couldn’t move. I had the knife and I didn’t _do_ anything. I hate myself for not stabbing him. I hate myself for what I let him do to me. I was still wearing my baseball uniform. I remember the way his hands felt when he touched my arm…”

His own words faded away into the darkness that he had tried to keep buried. Snoke had stroked his arm and he felt the tattered scratch of a hangnail trail down his skin again. The touch quickly turned to a harsh hand, gripping his arm. Under the bruising pressure, he couldn’t pull away. His lungs weren’t working and his legs were frozen. His hand was stiff and the knife clattered to the floor when Snoke tossed him onto the rotten sofa against the wall. The springs squeaked and poked at his body, jabbing him in the back. There was dust hanging in the air, only visible between the gaps in the slats that blocked the windows. He was on the sofa and Snoke pressed his knee down on his chest. _You’re a stupid boy. And now you will learn how stupid you really are_. The words couldn’t even make him scream. The pressure on his chest stopped him from breathing. Snoke’s hands ripped open his shirt and he could gulp down air when the old man finally stepped off him. He remembered gasping _no_ when he reached for his pants.

He was in the wasteland of his mind when the now, the reality, shook him. Poe was holding him. Poe had kissed him. And now he was resting his face against his friend’s soaking wet t-shirt.

“You can keep going.” Poe’s voice echoed through his memory, lifting him out of the nightmare of Snoke’s hands on his body. “You can also stop. It’s up to you. But I want you to keep going. I care about you so much. I’m listening, really. I’m here.”

He blinked hard, willing the hotel room to come into his vision. He never wanted to return to that couch. But Poe had taken him there and then brought him back.

“He raped me. He wanted me to scream and cry, to hold me down as he shoved his fingers inside me. I was bleeding, I felt it. There was blood all over my legs and he didn’t stop. Every time he moved, he’d hiss and drool, dragging his hands all over my body. Every finger felt different and I could count every new scratch. I didn’t even fight him. I let it happen. I could have bit him. I could have kicked him. But I didn’t do anything. He made me look at him. My blood was on his hands and shoved his fingers in my mouth until I gagged and fucking looked at him. He was hard and I had no idea what that even looked like then. It looked like a monster coming out of his body. And he…held me down. And raped me and I never thought it would stop. The way it kept going made it slow down time and I was trapped there, only living in that place forever. There was nothing that happened before and nothing would ever happen but that. He was holding my throat and was inside me. Nothing ever hurt like that before. It burnt. My legs wouldn’t work. It felt like my guts were falling out as he was fucking me. I could smell his breath and his…come…when he bit my mouth. I was just seven. That’s not supposed to happen.” He sobbed, his stubbornness finally broken from only shedding silent tears. “And when I looked away, I could only see a boy who had died for me.”

He was waiting for Poe to push him away, to scream at him for being dirty and weak, but instead he pulled him closer. The tears came warm and heavy then and he wept, feeling Poe’s sobs join his own.

“That’s why you can’t like me,” he mumbled. “I’m useless and disgusting. There’s nothing good in me because no matter what I do, I let him fuck me.”

“Kylo, no. Fucking _no_.” Poe’s hand was soft as it rested against his cheek. He forced him to meet his eyes. “You said it yourself. You were _seven_. You had just watched him kill someone, killed a _kid_. You didn’t _let_ him do anything. He hurt you. He hurt you in the worst way. None of that was your fault.”

“But I still didn’t fight back.” His voice was hardly a whisper. “I couldn’t fight back for seven years.”

“It doesn’t matter how long it takes. You still killed him. You didn’t let him kill you or Rey. You got her out. You got _yourself_ out. You survived.” Poe took his hand and brought it to his lips, pressing a light kiss on the tips of his fingers. “And now you’ve told me. I can be there to help you. I know people you can talk to. They’re not doctors, but you can talk to them. You’re not alone anymore. I really promise, Kylo, I still like you.”

Kylo had closed his eyes, still being drawn back into his mind. At the final words, he looked at Poe again. “Why.”

“A person doesn’t have to be perfect for you to like them,” Poe answered in an instant. “And I’m not trying to fix you or trick you or whatever you’re thinking right now. I just want to get you a couple of notches closer to normal. You know, like you want.”

Rey’s arms weren’t as strong as Poe’s, but her hugs were sweeter. Still, he leaned into the other boy’s embrace and felt safe. Letting out a long sigh, one that came from his toes and left his mouth, he wanted to shake his head. Instead, he leaned closer and kissed him. The salt from their tears tainted the kiss. He tried to push it away, reaching again for the warmth of intimacy to overtake the emptiness that had swept over him at his confession.

After returning the kiss, Poe pulled away, resting his forehead against his. “You believe me?”

“I want to.” Kylo’s voice felt hollow, but he meant it.

The room was quiet again and Poe smiled at him. “Let’s go to bed, okay? We can talk tomorrow after we get home. I think you’re done talking right now, right?”

He nodded and felt his companion give him a parting kiss before leaving the bed. Not wanting to move, he curled up against a pillow and studied the wall. The wallpaper was peeling in the corner. The pattern was faded and didn’t line up. He finally found a seam along the wall and watched it start to grow before his eyes, spreading out to swallow the room. Longing to dive into the abyss, his trance was only broken when he felt a toothbrush shoved into his hand.

Poe made him get up. He felt like Rey when she was having an empty day. He was guided in his motions to finish the night. Brushing his teeth, washing his face. Poe even ran a comb roughly through his tousled hair. He wouldn’t even let his mother do this for him. Managing to smile at him, he avoided the mirror as he wandered back into their room.

He looked dumbly at the two beds. His spirit was lifted when Poe, only in a pair of pyjama pants, turned down the covers on his bed. The other bed sat untouched.

He silently stripped down to his boxers and turned out the light.

Climbing into bed beside a warm body that was much closer to his own size, but still small enough to make him feel secure, he hoped that sleep would come easily that night.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for graphic depiction of a past rape and...
> 
>  
> 
> ...teenage boys kissing.
> 
>  
> 
> byeeeeee.


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey and Ben are both conflicted about the change in Poe and Ben's relationship. 
> 
> Read the tags and the warnings at the end.

Rey woke up when she heard the back door open. It always sounded a little clearer than the front door. It also meant someone who wasn’t a stranger was coming in the house. She’d figured that out long ago. Kylo had told her to go to sleep when he’d called earlier from the road that they’d be late, and she listened when her body had started to make her cry out of frustration. She was so glad that this was the last weekend that Kylo would be away. He didn’t sound disappointed about state; he just started talking about next season. He asked her about how dance practice was. She said that she didn’t want dance to end because she had so many friends there. But then he had to go and she focused on how it meant he would be home soon.

Her hands felt weak as she pushed herself out of bed and tried to make her sleepy legs work as she made her way towards the bedroom door and then out towards the stairs down to the kitchen.

Instead of just one voice talking to mom and dad, there were two.

Poe was there with Kylo. He was leaning against the fridge, with his arms folded, retelling something from their weekend away from her. Kylo had his back to her, sitting at the table, looking bored. She could tell by his shoulders.

“…he was doing really well too. The other guy probably cheated.”

She was yawning at the top of the stairs, looking down at them. The way down to the kitchen suddenly seemed bigger, like it grew since she’d eaten dinner. Kylo glanced up and smiled at her; it was a rare smile for anyone else, but normal for her. She tilted her head and fought back another yawn. Why was he smiling if he lost? He left the other three at the table and strode to the bottom of the stairs. She found her feet and quickly ran to him.

“Hi Rey,” he said, hugging her tightly. His arms felt better, warming her. “I missed you.”

“Where were you all night?” She asked, wanting to sleep again.

“I’m sorry. There was a problem with the car. I’m sorry it’s so late. I missed you,” he repeated. His voice was enough to wake her up. She wanted to tell him about how Finn hadn’t listened to her today in school and that their project had been ruined. Shaking her head, she pulled out from the hug and then smiled at him again.

“I missed you too,” she said. “Is Poe staying over again? Like Hux used to do?”

She must have been tired to say his name, but she also knew that Kylo missed him too. Time was mixing again as her mind rocked between before and now. It was hard to tell when bringing up someone who was not gone, yet still gone, would make him react or not.

“Yeah. It’s too late to drive him home. His dad is…not like our dad. He doesn’t love him. And he’s my friend.” Kylo looked like he had more to say but stopped, to smirk at her. “Really, this time.”

“I already told you that.” She grinned at him then glanced up at Poe. He was talking to mom and dad, pretending that he wasn’t listening to them. “Will you be up soon?”

Kylo nodded, only after looking over his shoulder. “Really soon. And we’ll have tomorrow together.”

Rey liked the promise. She nodded and turned to climb the stairs again. It was always annoying to be caught between being asleep and awake. She didn’t see everything and she was still caught in dreams and couldn’t hear all of the words.

Back upstairs, she climbed into bed. Scratching at her eyes, she forced herself to stay awake until Kylo came to bed. Her small nails pinched at her arm, raising the colour and sending a small jolt through her body. She wanted to hear what he had to say once his friend fell asleep. She also needed to talk to someone who wasn’t mom and dad. It had been a long weekend of feelings and the problems with teachers and other children.

Still, she was half asleep when the boys came into the room.

“How are you doing, Rey?” Poe asked. “I think it’s my fault we were late. I’m sorry, sweet pea.”

She looked up and looked at him. Her eyes were blurry as she blinked off sleep. “It’s okay. I’m sorry I couldn’t stay up.”

“Nah, this is the best time to get all the sleep that you can get. Everything gets worse when you’re bigger. There’s too much to do and not enough time to sleep,” he said, sitting on the bed. “How was your weekend while we were busy losing?”

“It was okay. I got into an argument with my friend. But I’ll figure it out,” she answered.

Kylo was by her side. She hadn’t even heard him come around to sit by her until he pulled her into his arms. He nuzzled her neck and gave her a soft kiss on the cheek. It made her sigh and feel even more like sleeping. Kylo meant home.

She didn’t really hear the knock on the door until mom spoke. “Boys? We have the sleeping bag and pillow in the closet. We can also get the extra mattress, the camping one, but it’s in the garage.”

She felt Poe stand from the bed. He was quickly apologizing and saying that it was fine and all right to Leia. He didn’t mean to come unexpectedly and they shouldn’t do so much for him. He sounded so nervous the entire time. Kylo just hugged her closer, listening and not speaking.

“I need to talk to him about being here, about some things that I’ll tell you about later,” Kylo leaned down and whispered only to her. “You can go to sleep.”

She turned her head and slowly blinked to him. _You still don’t trust him?_

He met her eyes. After a flash of glancing up, he looked down at her again. _I want to_.

She snorted a laugh and hugged him. Once her arms loosened she crawled under the covers. Sleep would feel so good right now. She could push her worries down until tomorrow and maybe solve some of them herself. Finn just needed to wait longer when he was building something. Maybe she could teach him that. She didn’t need to hear about wrestling or boy things. Those were always things that Hux and Kylo would talk about, when Kylo was having good days. He’d stopped talking about their time with Snoke. She missed when he’d talk about real things with Hux, before he went away. Maybe they weren’t friends anymore because Hux only wanted to talk about boy things. Poe and Kylo talked about real things too, but if Kylo was happy, then it was probably silly things.

Kylo stood off the bed and she started to let sleep take her. “Let’s…she needs to sleep. She’s so tired. She has so much to say to me that she can’t…Come on. Downstairs.”

They left the room and Rey finally saw black.

 

-=-

 

Snoke was stroking her leg, his yellow eyes burning into hers. The claw grew larger to dig into her flesh. He sneered and opened his mouth. It was filled with the faces of the gone children. They were stretched out and screaming, begging her for help with black eyes. But his mouth only grew wider, trying to draw her in. She tried to reach out and could only scratch at the ground; there was no one there. She was alone. The thundering fear of isolation was pulling her closer to Snoke’s stinking mouth.

Rey jolted awake from the nightmare and reached for Kylo.

But he wasn’t there. The lamp was still on and the bed was still empty.

Rubbing at her eyes, she looked down at the sleeping bag. There was no one there.

Stupid boys. It was like with Finn and Ethan. They’d ignore her and Rose if they had boy things to talk about. She didn’t get it; why were there separate girl and boy things? Maybe that’s why they’re stupid.

She crept out of the room, only to see that mom and dad’s door was closed. They never really heard anything, but she was still careful. When Kylo was away, their door would be open to her. Now, he should have been there. Descending down the staircase, she smiled as Lumpy rose from his dog bed in the kitchen to greet her. He was the best dog. She was going to go the other way on his walk the next day. The other side of the neighbourhood hadn’t been fully explored. He needed to smell more things.

But down in the basement, she could hear Kylo. She looked at Lumpy and motioned with her head to go back and not annoy him right now. If Kylo was talking this late, it must be about the tournament or something that happened at school. Or maybe he was having the bad thoughts again, the ones that even she couldn’t chase away when they got to the deepest level.

Moving down the stairs from the kitchen, she peaked around the corner to the stairs to the basement. They led directly down from the back door. She double-checked that it was locked before turning to nudge open basement door more open. The light was on and she could make out voices but not words.

She padded down the first stairs, about to ask why they weren’t in bed when she stopped, spotting the two of them on the couch.

Poe was touching Kylo’s hair. Kylo wasn’t ducking away from it.

They couldn’t see her as she crouched down on the top step. The couch was in the centre of the room, facing the old television. But nothing was on. They weren’t watching anything. She leaned forward into the light of the basement. The small bulb on the ceiling was more orange than white now. Han had promised to replace it but had never done it. She probably didn’t see what she thought she saw.

“It’s…I like when you do that, but stop, please,” Kylo said, his voice low. Gooseflesh bristled her arm at the sound.

“I like doing it, but yeah, okay.”

“I…I should have said more when we were driving. I was talking too much now.” She could hear the scowl in his voice as she sucked in tiny breaths through her nose. “I’m still figuring this out. Why I’m not more…afraid.”

“Hey, it’s okay. You’re letting me touch you. And keep telling me when to stop. I don’t want to, but I will.” Why was he saying that? They touched one another before? Hadn’t they? The questions started to build and Rey wanted to blurt them out and stamp on the stairs.

Instead, she silently slid down one more step, still partially hidden by the slats of wood that lined the side of the basement stairs. But she could see more of them now. Her ears could pick up how hushed the room was and put her hand over her mouth to disguise her breathing.

“I don’t know why I like this. I want to hate this. I feel like I was ripped open yesterday and…you put me back together.” Kylo was facing Poe. She could only see the back of his head, but his shoulders looked rigid. She tried to shift forward without making a sound. Kylo had taught her how to do it so she knew that she could. “It’s…It’s still raw to me.”

The only person who could possibly spot her was Poe, but he was focused on Kylo. “We have more time to talk about what happened. I shouldn’t have done that. I don’t want you to be afraid of me, but I’ll get it if you want me to back off. We can just hit reset. It won’t be the first time I’ve fucked up a friendship by…being too intense. Jumping you and not reading the signs.”

“No, I…” Kylo paused and Rey’s eyes widened as he reached to cup Poe’s face. Kylo’s long fingers rested against the plush face. “I still don’t know why you like me.”

“I told you. You’re…you’re handsome. I don’t want to say that you’re cute, but you are. Don’t argue with me about it. You are. You’re tall and destroy people with your eyes. I knew from the moment I met you that I wouldn’t be able to talk to you without saying something stupid. I cut through all of the bullshit at school and liked you more when I got to know you. I’m not just spouting lines. What you told me last night never should have happened to anyone, especially not a kid. I’m…glad that you trusted me enough to share it with me.” Poe’s voice dipped and he pulled Kylo into a hug. Rey had to lean forward and didn’t hear what he said next.

From where she sat on the stairs, she watched Kylo reach up to touch Poe. And then he kissed him. Poe’s eyes fluttered shut and he leaned into it.

Her legs wouldn’t move. If she hadn’t been so well trained at being silent, by brute force and vicious threats, she would have cried out at them: _No, he’s mine_.

Poe shifted and whispered things that she couldn’t hear in Kylo’s ear. He could have seen her. He should have seen her.

Her heart was pounding too loudly. She needed to leave.

Despite how hard she wanted to look back, she left the stairwell. Moving to climb the kitchen steps, her mind was too full and she hit the edge of Lumpy’s bed.

He barked.

And Rey froze.

 

-=-

 

“I don’t want to push you,” Poe whispered into their embrace. “If you’re confused, then it’s okay. We can go back to how it was. I don’t want to lose you. I promise I won’t be mad.”

Kylo nodded, sitting back to stroke the smooth face beside him. He didn’t know how to feel. He was home now. He’d seen Rey. He’d seen his parents. And he was still searching for a way to kill the fear within him.

He’d felt stuck for so long. He wanted everything to stop happening so slowly. The days that he’d waste sleeping away, he’d imagine waking up and everything being done: he’d have graduated high school, be done with college, and be an adult having breakfast with Rey in their apartment. But now, the image turned: Rey was crying because some boy didn’t like her. He’d be filled with fury that she cared about someone else, especially if that other boy didn’t return her affections. They were supposed to be for him, but there was a decade in between them. What if he didn’t know how to talk to her about this? Being stuck had meant he was just letting the days go by, more focused on hurting himself and getting release that way.

He pulled Poe closer and their lips met again. He still had to fight his feelings from earlier. But maybe Poe was right; maybe he should stop. But this was something new, something different that wasn’t watching blood wash down a shower drain. He liked hugging Rey, and she liked his hugs. And right now, he was getting hard and was desperate to keep kissing Poe to stop the panic that still pounded in the back of his head. He was starting to feel less clumsy in how his hands moved and braced Poe’s back, more certain.

Another person could feel pain, but they could also feel pleasure. If others could share sadness, then maybe it could work another way.

Poe was still kissing him, pressing closer. He felt a rush when the other boy gripped his waist and it washed over him in rapid waves. He couldn’t breathe suddenly and turned out of the kiss.

But Poe was in his ear, instantly pulling away. “It’s okay, it’s okay. I’m sorry. I’ll stop. I was too quick. Too much, too quick. Are you okay?”

He was about to say that he wanted to push through his panic, to be _normal_ and get off like everyone else always talked about, when the dog barked.

It was an echoing sound, like Snoke’s feet on the staircase or a dying gasp from a child that would never leave him. It meant being trapped. It meant something wrong had happened.

Poe scrambled away and Kylo instantly stood and looked up the staircase, arching his body to get the full view.

But it was silent from the staircase, the door just as he’d left it. The kitchen was quiet, except for the dog. His claws clicked for a few seconds and then he settled in his bed again.

Until his ears picked a light squeak from the floor above them.

Poe hadn’t heard it and reached for his hand. He lightly squeezed it then quickly pulled away.

“Wait here,” he said.

It had been stupid to be down there and expect his parents not to be listening or watching them. Someone was always watching. He was getting soft, thinking that he could actually trust his parents to not be like Snoke. He steadied his shoulders, ready to see his father sitting at the table when he climbed the stairs. Every step, he tried to make sound natural. It wasn’t like he was expecting an execution, despite how much he wanted one. He had excuses ready in his mind as he nudged open the basement door. He was also ready to do anything to keep Poe, to be allowed to figure out what he wanted from him on his own terms. Would his father be mad? Would he hit him? That’s what Poe expected. That’s why this was wrong.

But instead of his dad, Rey was looking in the fridge. The door was to him, but the light was softly cast on her body. Her bare feet wiggled as she looked through a drawer at the bottom.

She heard his feet and stood up, leaning back to look at him. Her face was washed out by the bright light in the dark kitchen. “When are you coming to bed?”

He blinked off nothingness and shook off his imagined arguments. She could read his body language if he did anything off right now. “Soon. We’re almost done talking. We thought it was…boring for you.”

 _Lies_ , _you’re lying_ , he kept waiting for her to say. He wanted her to say it. Now, what Poe was saying made sense. _This_ was why he should be confused. The haunting feelings of Snoke’s abuse pierced his mind; he loved Rey but was filled with a greater terror that he’d somehow hurt her that way, in the worst way. She could never end up like him. He’d fought with his bare hands to save her from the worst pain and now he was spiralling into his dark thoughts that had been reawakened by a memory that he had fought to keep buried. She could probably see it all in his eyes as he stood dumbly at the open fridge door in his childhood home. This was the place he’d promised her that she be safe. He quietly hoped that she would see it in him and pull away and run from him.

But instead, Rey just shrugged.

“I don’t like it when boys talk. Finn talks to Ethan and it doesn’t make any sense,” Rey grabbed a carrot and closed the door, running her fingers down the handle before turning. “If I eat this, do I have to brush my teeth again?”

She had just come down for something to eat. It was fine. There was no fight here, other than the one in his mind. They were having a normal conversation, in a place that meant warmth and love. “Yeah, you do. I’ll come help you soon. I promise.”

“Kylo, I love you,” Rey said, before biting down on her snack. She chewed loudly; it emphasized that he was being carried away from her with every bite.

“Love you too.” He smirked at her, still willing himself to calm down.

She took her carrot and went upstairs again. She’s said that because she caught the strange look in his eyes and was trying to figure it out herself. And he let his shoulders finally loosen. Shaking his head, he took the few steps down to the entrance landing, before taking only two steps down to the basement. “I think it’s bedtime.”

He could only see the back of Poe’s head, but he turned and met his eyes. He was still trying to figure out what every look from his friend meant. But this look wasn’t the disappointed one that he expected. The second he had pressed closer, Kylo had been frozen in the moment of torture without pain. He was locked in his own head, unable to give into his own body. But Poe had still stopped, afraid of hurting him. If the dog hadn’t barked, Kylo might have wanted something more: to edge more closer to being normal; to kill whatever Snoke had forced into him.

But that didn’t happen. And now it was time for bed and he had even more questions for himself.

Poe just grinned and followed him up the stairs, brushing their hands together as they went. Kylo paused at the top, near the landing and squeezed his hand, wanting to both forget and draw on the strength he’d been gifted in the last twenty-four hours. He gave him a long look before the other boy nodded and took a step back.

They entered his room two paces apart.

Rey was still eating a carrot, petting Lumpy on his bed. The dog smelled but was happy where he was.

“Why did you wake up?” Kylo had to wrench himself from the hallway back to his room. Poe was still lingering in the doorway until he glared at him and he finally sat down on edge the bed to pet the dog. Kylo was beside Rey but he could still feel another pair of cautious brown eyes looking at him from across his broad bed.

“I had a nightmare, but it was okay. I’m learning, Kylo. You’ve taught me how to do it so I’m better than you. I wanted to draw a picture, but I got hungry instead. But it would have been better if you were here.” Rey ate the last of her carrot, in between her words. He felt a new form of hatred towards himself in that moment.

He wanted a life. He wanted to do what he wanted. She needed him to erase the last of Snoke from his veins.

His body and mind had never betrayed him more than before the last day. He would rather be stuck right then than drifting into this.

If his hands weren’t already in motion, he would have stopped to fall fully into the hole of his thoughts at that moment. Instead, he nudged her up. Without words, they went off to brush their teeth. He knew that if he opened his mouth, it would all come tumbling out with renewed tears.

He plopped Rey down on the red footstool and she reached for her toothbrush without question. It was something that he hated as a kid and he never wanted to force Rey, but after all of the annoyance of the dentist the last half year, he didn’t want her to have his teeth. It also had made him not want to be lazy, despite all of the distractions surrounding him.

He caught Poe’s eyes in the mirror and returned a small smile, in between brushing. There was almost a glow around all of them and he longed to reach for it, to break what he knew was real and what his eyes were telling him.

Rey quietly finished brushing her teeth, setting her brush in place. She turned to them both and he saw her squirm. “I need to pee.”

Kylo finished rinsing his mouth and nodded. After a brief glance and an awkward positioning of his worn brush on the edge of the sink, Poe followed him out of the room and closed the washroom door behind him.

When they were in his room, he exhaled dramatically. At least, that’s what Paige would have said.

“I really like spending time with her, it makes me feel less mature, you know? I know people twice her age who don’t know how to say what they want without sounding bitchy,” Poe said, nervousness making him talk more than he should. “I don’t even think she can be little-kid whiney.”

He’d been too quiet. He swallowed, glad to focus on Rey when he opened his mouth. That was safe. His room was also safe.

“She can be, and she’s allowed to be,” Kylo said, before shaking his head. He quickly pulled off his shirt and tossed it aside. He slid out of his jeans and was trying to untangle how Poe was looking at him as he undressed. It wasn’t the first time he’d seen him like this. And they only had so long.

His ears burned as he finally pushed out his words. “She won’t be long. Get changed.”

“Yeah, yeah. Okay.”

 

-=-

 

Rey had lied. She just wanted to close the washroom door and be alone. She knew why Kylo lied; her own little lies felt better when she did the same.

She wanted to run when she was in the kitchen. She wanted to run upstairs and hide under the covers and pretend that whatever she thought she saw hadn’t happened.

But she couldn’t be like Hux. Kylo hated cowards who ran when they were afraid. She wasn’t afraid, though. She had just been worried.

She stared at herself in the mirror, picking out the things wrong with her face. Her freckles, her dimples. One of her teeth was loose and wiggled too much. She liked to press on it with her tongue and push it as far as it could go. So she did that. It felt better than being jealous.

Jealously and envy were something that her and Maz had talked about. How was it fair that other kids grew up with real mom and dads and hers had always been dead? Maz would tell her that’s envy. Other kids may have a mom and a dad, but there were also kids with mean mom and dads; _your pain is real, Rey. That pain won’t get better unless you understand how others are feeling. Every pain is unique and it helps to realize that others can hurt too_. Poe’s dad hurt him. Thinking about him made her frown and look away from the mirror. He was nice to her. He was her friend. He wasn’t doing anything to hurt her, because it was Kylo who had kissed him. That’s what jealously was.

Could Poe take Kylo away from her?

She looked into her own eyes and pushed on her tooth again.

No. No he couldn’t.

He was Kylo’s friend. He was her friend too.

Kylo kissed her all the time. And Kylo also had other friends. Kylo needed more friends. He felt better when more people really cared about him, even though he didn’t say it to anyone but her.

He had been so afraid when he thought Poe didn’t want to be his friend anymore. He’d been so upset. He got better when he could talk to Poe. Maybe they didn’t just talk about stupid boy things.

Rey didn’t want him to feel that way again. And Kylo wasn’t a kid anymore.

She weakly kicked at the bathroom counter. _That_ part wasn’t fair. She’d always be behind him.

But if she had her own friends, he could have his.

She was still too little. But that meant she’d always have space in his friendships. The good things about being small weren’t just because tinier hands could grab food without being seen or that lighter feet made less of a sound when hiding in a new spot to avoid getting burned by hot metal.

Kylo hated talking to Maz. But if he could talk to Poe about teenager things, and to her about real things, then she couldn’t really be jealous. She talked to Rose about kid things that Kylo wouldn’t understand.

Blinking she looked away from the mirror. Next year, she’d be the same age as Kylo when he stopped being a kid.

That part was really not fair.

She sat down on the red footstool and frowned to herself. She hated that she’d started forgetting everyone who died. She hated it so much that she would cry in the small washroom at school when the thoughts swooped down on her, when Snoke’s shadow got too heavy.

Swallowing, she stood again.

Blinking at herself, she nodded. Right. She’d feel better in the morning. Dad always said that. Mom too. She needed good thoughts before she went to sleep. She thought about being older, being grown up. That’s when things wouldn’t hurt. That’s when Snoke would stop chasing her and Kylo. They’d be happy, but stressed about normal things. About having to go to work, like Han and Leia always complained about. Like having to pay bills, like everyone had to do. At least she’d like to make dinner; she’d never complain about that.

Tomorrow, she’d make dinner. It would be good. Kylo would help her and they’d read through a recipe on his phone and he’d hug her and the hours would stop for a while. Kylo had a friend; he was a boy. But she was a girl. She owned his heart. She didn’t need the rest right now.

She stepped down off the footstool and sighed to herself.

She really did have to pee.

 

-=-

 

Kylo kept his head down but could catch glimpses of Poe’s skin as he pulled pyjamas from his bag and then shoved his others clothes back into them. Kylo fully turned away, pulling on a t-shirt from his closet. When he turned, he couldn’t manage a kind look at that point. They were feet apart, wearing what they usually wore on the road. He was unraveling as things started to overlap into a grey blur; he couldn’t find the edges to put them where they should be.

“Sit beside me,” he said, unsure of his own voice.

Poe was just staring at him, running his hand on the television stand. Kylo sat heavily on the bed and slowly put his head in his hands, trying to breathe.

“You can freak out. Please freak out. I want to freak out.” Poe was just nattering and Kylo glared at him until he finally sat down beside him.

“I’m not doing that,” he answered, sitting up. “You don’t have to either. I should have figured this out earlier.”

Poe kept petting the dog, but was looking at him. “Look, I kissed you. And you didn’t stop me. I was just talking before. I can handle this because I like you. I’m your friend, no matter what happens.”

“No, yes, why would you want to be,” he answered, rapidly spitting out his words before finally pausing for a breath. He pursed his lips and finally shook his head. “Okay, yeah. I’ll…I’ll figure it out soon. What I want.”

The washroom door was still closed so he wasn’t surprised when Poe kissed him lightly on the cheek. “That was just…sorry. Don’t think that I don’t get sadness, Ky. It made me do something stupid yesterday and I can’t take that back. But I can at least try to make it better.”

Kylo was always searching for pain in other people, whether or not he could cause it or what they felt from the world around them. Part of him would rather be the cause of that pain; at least then, he’d understand why it was there. And he found it directly in what Poe had just said. He was hurting from having to stay away from him, to make sure he felt comfortable. There were few people who had done that for him before.

But he was also just a kid too. A kid who was always afraid to go home. Because there was an authority figure there who made it an unsafe place.

Snoke was an adult. Snoke was an evil husk, in the body of a man. He was the ultimate authority; he decided who lived or died.

Poe could maybe make mistakes with him. He was filled with a nervous energy that splintered off in too many directions and caught him off guard, like last night. Even if he made some errors, maybe touched him when he didn’t want it, it would always be his own fault. He would always be too torn about what he wanted and what he needed. He couldn’t even touch himself in the shower, too afraid to edge onto horrific memories that he’d kept buried.

But he’d already started to dig it up. Doubt was still filling his head, but he’d started to undo some of the hurt. He was done being stuck. Rey was too little to understand; she’d kept quiet about the demons that he knew that she had. He’d tried to warn her before they got home, and he really thought that she understood. Now, her world was friends and making mistakes with her teachers. It was about ruined art projects now, not getting beaten and raped. He couldn’t tell her now that the demons would always be lurking. He wanted to tell her now, to get it over with and blurt it out, but it would just burden her with still trying to grow up too fast.

His mind was switching between thoughts too quickly. The parts of him that had been torn apart were almost in two pieces now.

Poe was younger, but had managed to pin him a few times in practice, despite lacking really fundamental techniques, which frustrated him. Poe was strong and could stand up for himself. Well, when he let him. Kylo briefly leaned against the other boy when he realized how quickly he had gone after anyone who had shown a bit of malice against him. But Kylo couldn’t hurt him the way he could hurt a girl. He tried to imagine kissing and holding Paige like he’d done and how easily he could have pulled her too close and hurt her. This was safer. They were friends; this was a part of their friendship. Even though Poe was pressing him, he would always stop. He wasn’t like a girl like Liza, who didn’t listen. Girls could be hurt and couldn’t be trusted. Rey could be trusted but he couldn’t think about that before she had a chance to really grow up in a way that he never got the chance to.

There was nothing evil in Poe. But Kylo knew there was evil inside of him.

The way that his body reacted to him brought up a thick anxiety in his throat. The idea that someone wanted to touch him in a gentle way, opposed to Snoke’s vicious strokes and cruel penetration, was still pressing on his mind. He’d _told_ Poe what had happened and he still wanted him and seemed to shrug off how damaged he was; instead, he seemed to focus on helping and understanding him.

The toilet flushed and he nodded again to the other boy to get on the other side of the bed. Poe met his eyes and shook his head in warning. He saw true and real discomfort in Poe’s eyes as he shifted from the bed to the floor beside him, onto the sleeping bag. Lumpy sat up and panted, looking at the door and waiting with excitement for Rey. The dog didn’t seem to care that he was melting down inside and trying to pull down others into the acid with him.

Rey’s eyes were heavy when she came into the room. But she quickly blinked out of the look and put on a smile. She had been upset that they had been late; he didn’t blame her for walking around with too many thoughts in her head when the same thing was happening to him. She still hadn’t told him about what had happened at school, nor what had brought on the nightmare.

_I think it’s okay._

He frowned. _That what’s okay?_

 _It’s just okay. I just figured it out._ Her smile quirked, setting off her dimples. She’d been thinking, making up a scenario in his head that he couldn’t make tangible in his mind.

There were so few moments when he couldn’t understand what Rey meant, but he always forgot how young she was. He had been so used to being caught in a closed cycle of things never changing that it still shook him that she was changing while he was trying to be stuck. She was growing and he was losing his grip on every thought that she had in her head.

It was almost two years since they escaped.

The pressure of the anniversary swooped down on him suddenly, but he still met Rey’s eyes. She seemed to understand why his face faltered and nodded at him. She didn’t know what happened last year but he still dragged up that hatred when he wanted to make the world around him feel more real. Being so close to ending his life, snuffing out his broken existence, should have been freeing. But it wasn’t. He reached out to someone he could trust and he kept his end of the deal: no one knew. He blinked randomly and Rey finally gave him an _I know_ look.

It had always been her and him.

And now, there was this.

Or there could be this. If he wanted.

But in the end, it would always be him and her.

He slid over and Rey climbed onto the middle of the bed. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed her cheek before settling down.

He couldn’t say anything. He couldn’t move.

The room was quiet, except for three breaths. And a happy, clueless dog that was scratching on the foot of his bed. He wanted to kick at the dog, but then everyone would just get mad at him.

He closed his eyes, willing the memories from how stupid he had been to fade away, holding Rey closer.

He was too tense to sleep, but tried to let his body go loose. He tried to listen to what Poe had said before.

But he couldn’t.

He was holding Rey. And she needed to sleep.

And he couldn’t react.

He hugged her again and she sighed, leaning into his embrace. She hummed a light song to herself, something that he didn’t recognize. He never wanted these small moments to end. Part of him wanted her to stay small forever, to never have to deal with the same problems that he was wrestling with.

He almost forgot about his friend on the side of his bed as he felt her fall asleep in his arms.

Lightly kissing her forehead, he shifted away, turning slowly. The rising regret and desperate panic seemed to form a block in his chest. But he still turned over. He saw Poe’s eyes as he moved closer to the edge of the bed, but he tried to only focus on Rey. She was asleep. Her chest was rising and falling in the way that told him that she wasn’t pretending.

She was exhausted, and he was thinking about something else. Someone else.

Still, he pulled his arms away and nestled her against the mattress before he turned.

He hoped that Poe realized that they couldn’t talk. Rey could wake up at any moment. He just wanted to say goodnight. There couldn’t be anything more.

Poe seemed to get it. In the dim light of the lamp on his side table, he caught his smile. He mouthed goodnight and lifted his hand. Kylo reached out and brushed against it, still trying to nail down his feelings. But there were no demands of anything more, but no promises either.

They both nodded and Kylo turned away to hold Rey.

There was peace there, peace in familiarity. He’d always have her, no matter how much he sabotaged his life with impulsive thoughts.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More teenage boys kissing. And then angst. Filled with references to past rape, abuse, and torture.
> 
>  
> 
> For a more personal note from the author (me, an idiot with a PhD so if you have commonsense, just disregard what I have to say): I think I've apologized enough for my poor tagging (even though I want to keep apologizing). I'm not a big author in this fandom so I'm not bearing the brunt that someone else would, but I really do want to produce something that people want to engage with and give them something to think about in terms of dealing with trauma (in this case) and healing after it. I may have torpedoed this story, but for those of you still reading this, know that I will get you to a good place but there's a long, long road ahead (I don't want to jump the gun and put a chapter count out there but from the outline we're looking at 50 to 60 chapters here with about half of those already written and the rest roughly planned out). The main relationship tag is there for a reason, so trust me on that. Today, I finished proofreading 200+ pages of a dissertation on tariffs in the 19th century and then I taught undergrads all day about pre-industrial society in three two-hour seminar groups in a row with one more group tomorrow and then a lecture on Monday. And as I say to them, both my undergrads and the author of what I proofread, every opinion matters even if you disagree with what the author has to say. Just put it into context. 
> 
> And with that, I return to crying myself to sleep to Taylor Swift.


	19. Chapter 19

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey tries to understand how Kylo is feeling, finding others in her life who love her too. Kylo tries to do the same but tells Maz what happened without kind words after feeling ignored by Poe. The boys finally have a conversation about what happened. 
> 
> Read the chapter notes for warnings.

 

Rey woke up and stretched, letting her muscles and mind reach out in the same motion. She still yawned and rolled over, trying to wake up, no matter how much she wanted to go back to sleep. There were things to do on Sundays.

Kylo and Poe were sitting at the edge of the bed. Poe was wearing normal clothes, a wrinkled shirt and jeans. Kylo was just wearing pain underneath his pyjamas.

“I don’t want you to go,” Kylo was saying. He hadn’t heard that she’d woken up. She slowly rested her head again, hoping that he would miss that she was awake. She closed her eyes, staying as still as possible.

“I’ve got work and my mom is coming. Hey, I told you last night. We’ll talk on Monday. Ky, it’s just another day. I’m not going to ditch you because of something that I started that you didn’t want,” Poe said and stood from the bed. “I really, really like you. But I’ve messed you up. So I’m going to go to work, because that’s what I have to do not what I want to do. Can you just…help me out? Your parents scare the shit out of me.”

Rey finally yawned again when the boys left the room. She reached for another pillow and was half asleep when Kylo came back to bed. He crawled under the covers and curled up on the other side, away from her.

“Kylo?”

He didn’t respond.

“Is it a bed day?” She asked, sitting up and rubbing her eyes. He could have conversations that weren’t meant for her. It felt better to deal with how he was feeling if she knew what had made him upset. But she would still have to spend the morning trying to untangle why.

He sighed and spoke into his pillow. “I just want to sleep for a while. I’ll come downstairs later and we’ll have time together. I promise.”

“Do you want breakfast?” She asked, reaching to touch his shoulder.

“Not right now.”

She left him alone to what he had to think about. She should have told him again that it was okay but he needed her to be quiet. He wanted her to be quiet but wouldn’t ask her. After stopping in her room to get a stuffed animal, she went downstairs to find something to eat. Leia was already dressed for work, making Rey frown: it meant no pancakes that day. Han looked up from the newspaper and spotted her stuffed animal.

“He staying in bed today?” Han asked, not quite frowning.

Rey shrugged, sitting her bear at her spot at the table. “He didn’t want his friend to go. Can we give him some of your money? So he doesn’t have to work? We have too much.”

Han smirked. “It doesn’t work that way, sweetheart. And it’s your money, too.”

“So, can I give him some of my money?” She asked, folding her arms. She couldn’t hold back her smile when Han gave her a stern look. Her grin made his look break as well.

She ate her cereal and held her bear, trying to plan out her day in her head. Leia gave her a small hug before leaving for work. Everyone always had to go to work, even on the weekends. She needed to do something to help. When Kylo got up, she’d help him make the bed. Then she’d find something else to organize or clean up to keep her mind busy. It never took that long and there was always time for colouring or reading when she couldn’t stop her thoughts. Kylo would help her bake cookies later, she decided. He needed to do something too; he couldn’t spend all day being worried about Monday.

“What’s going on in your head?” Han asked and she had to shrug. “Not much or too much?”

“Just thinking,” she answered. “Kylo really likes his friend.”

Her cheeks reddened at the flash of memory from last night. She shouldn’t have been sneaking around and she was sure that Kylo would tell her how he felt when he could share those emotions with her. He needed his own life, she told herself again. Kylo had the worst days when he was worried about never being normal. He would argue with his parents more and then sit and do nothing but worry. She’d hold his hand and he’d finally give her a hug, telling her that he was figuring it out.

“He seems like a good kid. Ben has never had too many friends. When he was your age, all he wanted was just one best friend. Everyone else could go to hell. Sort of like you, baby girl. You find the right people and stick with them no matter what.” Han sat back, putting his hands behind his head. “What do they talk about? Good stuff or bad stuff?”

Rey thought again about what happened in the basement and lifted her shoulders. “Sometimes good stuff. Kylo thinks that he needs to take wrestling more seriously, and Poe just does it because it’s something to do. He’s not good at other sports either. They talk about school a bunch and it gets kind of boring because I’m not in those classes yet. I don’t mind when they talk about the bad stuff around me. Poe is sad too. I think his dad is mean to him. Why are some dads like that? Finn says that his stepdad yells at him when he makes a mess but you and mom never yell at me.”

“Well, you don’t make many messes. Your Kylo is the one that makes messes and we don’t yell at him either. It’s better to talk about how to do better next time than yell about it, right?” Han raised an eyebrow, settling back in his chair. It was his favourite chair. It was the only one at the table with armrests.

Rey nodded. “I get mad at Finn too when he makes a mess or ruins something. Sometimes I yell at him and I know that it makes him feel bad.”

Han leaned on the table, shaking his head. “Yeah, but you’re also good at apologizing and telling him why you were mad, right?”

“Yes,” she answered and then bit her lip. “Most of the time. Sometimes I get sad at myself and can’t find the words. And Finn still forgives me. I help him when he’s sad too.”

They had many conversations like this in the kitchen. She loved Han but still wondered if she would have had tiny talks like this with her real father. Would they have a nice house too? Everyone she knew had nice houses, but she saw from movies and television that there were bad houses too. After summer, then the houses would be fake scary too for Halloween. She liked candy and pretending to be someone else but couldn’t figure out why people wanted to be scared of creepy things. Maybe she’d ask to stay home on Halloween so she could see everyone else’s costumes instead this year.

Han got up from the table and gave her a hug. She smiled again at the warm embrace.

“Come on, let’s take the dog for a walk. Let him sniff those bushes that he likes. Go tell your Kylo that we’re going out and then get changed,” Han said. “Something warm, Rey. It’s pretty chilly out.”

Rey nodded and took her bear upstairs to check on Kylo.

He was sitting up in bed, reading. His English notebook was resting at his side. He was still in his pyjamas but had at least unfolded himself from the blankets.

“We’re taking Lumpy for a walk. Do you want to come?” She asked, looking at him from the edge of the bed, studying his long legs.

Kylo shook his head, keeping his gaze on his book for almost too long. It renewed the nervousness within Rey that he was going to disappear for the rest of the day. “I’m going to read. Is that okay?”

He looked up at her and she frowned at the lingering redness that she spotted in the corners of his eyes. Tilting her head, she watched him close the book and try to wipe away the sadness with the back of his hand. Climbing onto the bed, he opened his arms to her for a hug.

He held her too close, but she let him. As long as he was embracing her, she couldn’t ask him about what happened last night.

“It’s been a long weekend,” he mumbled into her hair. “I want to not think for a while.”

She had never understood that thought more than just then.

Changing into her favourite sweat pants and sweater, she tried to do the same.

 

-=-

 

Things didn’t happen quickly or slowly. They just _happened_.

And Kylo was left even more confused.

Poe met him on Monday and, even though it looked like it pained him, he was clear that he wanted to give him space. They had a closed conversation of hidden meanings by his locker, both talking and not talking about what happened. Poe had leaned against the row of lockers, playing with the combination lock. He turned the dial back and forth, looking at him with quick glances. He really wanted to give him time to think about it. This was so unclear for Kylo and he expressed that, asking why he needed to think about anything; the idea that someone other than Rey could read his moods was unsettling. He’d already made up his mind: he’d revealed how wrong it was for him to like him in grim details. Poe said he didn’t think that he was in any way permanently damaged, but that he probably needed time.

Poe pulled away slightly. He sat further away from him at lunch, not leaning fully towards him. Kylo now realized how often their knees would be pressed together when they ate when he lost that contact. His goodbyes were shorter. Even Paige made a remark, asking if they had a fight.

Tuesday was the same. He sat with Paige at dance practice, locking and unlocking his phone.

“That’s getting annoying,” she said, looking up from her book. “Just text him.”

“Text who?” The click of the phone locking punctuated his words.

“Ugh,” she groaned. “Kylo, come on. It’s annoying when you do that.”

“No it’s not,” he replied, looking up at her and quickly repeating the gesture on his phone. _Click-Clunk._

Paige exhaled and looked back at her book.

_Click-Clunk. Click-Clunk._

“I’m trying to finish this chapter for tomorrow,” Paige said with a warning tone in her voice. “Have you already done it?”

“I finished it last night,” he answered. “The whole book. It saves time.”

Paige sighed, putting her flimsy bookmark in its place. “Okay, then tell me how Chapter 10 ends. Save _me_ the time.”

“The hunters attack them and steal the glasses.” He started fiddling with his phone again. “Mrs Yaddle is probably going to ask about the fire symbolism and how they’re splitting apart.”

She sat up, reaching for his phone to snatch it from him. He let it shift into her hand, thankful to lose it. “What are you worried about?”

“It’s nothing,” he replied. He looked up at the girls. They were practicing for the spring concert in half-finished costumes. He’d watched his mother help Rey with hers from the doorway to his mother’s office. Rey was smirking as Leia measured Rey’s arms and legs and then draped the shiny fabric over them. Turning, Rey tilted her head at him.

Just like she was doing now. He quickly blinked a response that he was just zoning out and wasn’t bored. She rolled her eyes and called him a liar.

His phone plinged and his heart quickened at the sound.

“Okay, he’s not mad at you. He asked for your physics notes,” Paige said, moving to hand him back the phone. But she paused, drawing it back for a second. She looked from the phone, out to Rey, then back to him. “You’re allowed to have a best friend who’s your own age, Kylo. She’s not going to break, you know. She already calls him your best friend.”

Poe didn’t need his notes. He was asking how he was doing.

“I know,” he said, frowning. “It doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to worry about it.”

At least that part was true.

Wednesday was more of the same. They both did and didn’t talk. Poe gave him a long look during class, and then his eyes darted back to the board. Kylo responded by pulling up his hood and ignoring him.

His leg was bouncing so heavily in the car on the way home that his father reached over at a stoplight to forcibly stop him.

“Calm down,” he said. “Whoever it is, just don’t hit him if any teachers are watching.”

He glared in response and Rey sighed, loudly, at the joke.

Thursday came and he missed school because it was a therapy day. Liza was always jealous that he got to skip school and he had given up trying to tell her that it was nothing to envy. He’d rather be in school doing something useful, even though most of it was just mindless knowledge. He had a goal in mind and that was to get into a good university, get to the FBI. Grades mattered. Grades kept him breathing. Talking just wore him out in a closed space. The world had tilted the other night and he was still fighting to gain his balance.

They took the long drive into the city to meet with Maz. The air conditioning in the car made his throat hurt. The feeling continued into the dull offices that the FBI rented temporarily there. He mildly wondered if Agent Jinn could stand being there for one second. He’d said as much in their last email exchange. Kylo had done his best to analyze a profile. It had been more interesting than his English homework and more distracting than realizing how weak he was leading up to failing to qualify for state. He had sent Jinn what he thought of the profile and really thought he’d got it all wrong before they left, before Poe wrenched him into dealing with the memory he had left buried the longest and sent his body and mind into two parts.

He finally texted Poe as he waited for Rey to finish her session, to spill her thoughts into broken pieces and try to put them back together again. Poe answered him, but not right away. It was getting to the point where he was almost furious about the unneeded space. Rey had already said that she was okay. What was his problem?

It was that frustration that made him slip up with Maz. He was frowning at his phone when she asked who was upsetting him and why. He didn’t really think that he was in the room at the moment; he was floating somewhere above himself in his bewilderment, back to the glow of Poe’s smile in their shared reflection of the washroom.

“My friend kissed me and now he’s acting weird.” He shut his eyes instantly regretting saying it out loud.

Maz just shrugged, not writing anything on her notepad. “Maybe he’s thinking that it upset you, that you didn’t want him to do that.”

He argued with her with his eyes. It was fine because they were friends and he wanted this to be part of that friendship. He trusted Poe and didn’t want him to ignore him.

Maz had tried to pry it out of him before, to get him to deal with something that her and the other therapists thought likely happened but didn’t have proof of. Well, Poe had heard it and understood it better than she could. He’d had kept that part separate from everything else he had been forced himself to disclose. Agent Jinn would probably understand, yet he didn’t want him to think of him as dirty and wrong. Despite the locker room garbage talk about erections, making out, and fucking, he didn’t need to deal with it. It was only in the last half year that he’d wake up physically excited. He didn’t want to think of it as being better; he had just forced it away because it made him sick.

Rey would be cuddling him in the early mornings; the first time it happened, he knew what was going on but didn’t understand _why_ it was happening to him suddenly.

Trying to stroke himself in the shower just made him feel filthy, his skin crawling, and he felt like he wanted to vomit from the stress of his own hand. So he decided to not touch himself; but that was before. Looking at Maz, in this dull, rented office, he wanted to purge his mind of any of those thoughts. But still, he was quietly pondering if Poe could be patient enough to guide him through not hating his body’s reactions, to not pull away. It had been good, too good, to kiss him. It wasn’t really sexual if they were friends, he’d decided. It was a way to do things that made him excited without meaning anything more. He needed to break what was wrong within him. That’s why it had to be another boy, one who was his friend. He hadn’t truly felt attracted to anyone else, boy or girl, before; he was attracted to him as a person who shared his sadness. He saw the empty pockets within Poe that he also sought to refill in himself. He desperately didn’t want to lose him and needed to help him too.

Still, Maz openly grinned at him. Angered, he asked if she thought he was joking.

“I’m sure you’re more open with him than with me,” Maz started. Of course he was, Poe was his friend and not some shrink who got off on his misery. “Well, then tell him what you’re thinking about. Tell him about your writings, because if there is any advice that I’ve given you that you’ve actually listened to, it’s that I know that you write. All of the time. Kylo, we, or should I say I, talk about boundaries and how to have good friendships and relationships. Our friends help us think about how we feel and the choices that we make. If you like this boy and want a healthy relationship, you should be honest and ask him to be the same. Tell him why you’re not ready for some things and why you might be upset with some touches. You own your own body. It’s yours and trying to understand it will take time. You also have to remember to ask how he feels, like you do with Rey. Maybe he needs some time to think too.”

Kylo tilted his head, anger rising. “But he started it. And he listened when I said what happened with Snoke. Not like you.”

“Oh, I listen, Kylo. I listen.” Maz leaned forward, putting her notebook aside. “So, let’s have a real conversation. This isn’t going in my notes.”

He narrowed his eyes, hands gripping his thighs. “But you’re still going to remember it.”

“I don’t forget often. But if it helps you here, I’m willing to forget a few things. Did you want this boy to kiss you?” Maz leaned back, eyeing him with a slight grin.

He levelled his eyes at her. “I didn’t stop him.”

“And you were curious? I can see it in your eyes.” Maz lifted her large glasses, giving him a firm look. He sat up and fiddled with his sleeves. “Have you ever felt curious about someone like that before?”

Kylo rolled his eyes. “Feel like what? That I can trust someone? Isn’t that what you bitch at me all the time? To trust people? Well I trust him!”

“Curious as in that you’re attracted to him. You said that he kissed you. Did you kiss him back?” Maz was starting to sound more like Paige, gossiping about something to Liza. “You don’t have to tell me if it makes you uncomfortable.”

He had already felt that way the moment he had walked into the room. Maz’s large glasses and aggressive shoulder movements had always put him more on edge than at ease. He would never understand how Rey could stand her.

“I wanted to see what it felt like, yeah,” he answered, lifting his shoulders. “He’s not like Snoke. He would have to try really hard to hurt me. But I’m also not worried about hurting him, but not in the same way as if it were a girl. Girls are too…” He stopped talking, snapping his mouth shut.

“So, what you’re saying is that you’re afraid that you’d hurt a girl, but not a boy?” Maz kept sarcasm from her voice, but he still heard it.

“No, just him. I trust him and he’s my friend. I’ve already thought about all this,” he lied. “What’s your point?”

“Are you interested in sex? It’s good to have this conversation at this point. We’ve worked our way there and how to think about it in a healthy way. Many teenagers…”

“Many teenagers weren’t tortured by psychopaths while the police did nothing,” he snapped. “I already have to listen to this at school. Liza wears tank tops even when it’s freezing out and looks at me with big eyes and her…whatever, breasts. I see them but I don’t look at them. They’re nothing I want to look at because they’re a part of her and I can’t trust her. I don’t want to date anyone. I just want to have a friend who I trust.”

“Then maybe you should tell this boy that. Because he is probably ignoring you, or at least that’s what you think he’s doing, because he thinks about you in a different way.” Maz pursed her lips and looked very much like his mother in that moment.

From the lost part of him came a question, but his mouth crafted the response. “Is there a different way?”

“What do you think about when you think about sex?” Maz sat up, her normally passive eyes sharpening to match the tone that radiated from her body.

He couldn’t back down. Nothing in him would let him stop from arguing about this with her, even though the words were going to come out wrong. “Everyone talks about it. I don’t care who…,” he paused to shake his head out of the thought, “I’m in high school and everyone is talking about fucking and I’m just numb to it because I have to be. I mean, I…I don’t know what to do now. Or what do you want to hear? Okay, I liked it when he kissed me. Maybe it was because he’s sad too and I want to make his problems my own. Maybe it’s because he wasn’t Snoke. He wasn’t someone who I couldn’t trust who wanted to hurt me. He was just my friend. And now I think he hates me because I can’t get over all of this. You were supposed to help me and I’ve been just _nothing_ for two years. Where the fuck did you even get your degree? Are you really helping Rey?”

He was standing by the end, filled with red-faced rage. He had shouted at her and her expression had never changed. It made him swallow a scream and sit down again.

“Do you want to have sex with this boy, Kylo?” Maz asked, her face still neutral.

“I don’t know!” He shouted. “I don’t know and it’s…why did he do this? I want to make things better for Rey and now I’m fucking stuck again. And I just want him to kiss me again and tell me that it’s all right and not want to pull away because I just feel what Snoke did to me at the same time. And that’s so fucked up that I just want to die.”

Maz’s face finally flinched as he turned from her to stalk across the room. The artwork in this office was even worse than the last one. It was dull swirls of blues and pinks on white backgrounds.

He turned and sneered at her. “Is this your point? How much I should hate myself for not being normal by now?”

He clenched his jaw as he guided himself back to the couch with the force of her eyes. He followed her, even as his skull hurt from her command. He hated being told what to do, unless it was from someone who he trusted and that list was short. Maz was even below Hux on that scale in that moment.

“I liked that he kissed me. I’m tired of feeling like if someone touches me that I want to hurt myself.” Kylo stumbled over the words even though he’d just said them but he firmed his mouth. He wanted to keep going, to try to understand why he wanted to hurt others, while also being split when it came to those close to him. He switched to her topic, giving her what she wanted. “I’m tired of waking up and being hard and fucking afraid that I’m going to hurt Rey. Maybe if he helps me it will go away. I never want anyone to fuck me ever again. But if someone could just show me what the fuck is wrong with me then maybe I’d be okay! You haven’t done anything to help me! You’re so fucking useless!”

He snorted at her and stormed off of the couch again. He focused on the life outside of the window. He tried to think about what Rey was doing in the waiting room.

Then his phone plinged and he felt another tug at his heart. He turned from the window to grab his phone and glare at Maz again.

“Do you want to see how much he hates me now? For not being able to be normal?” He screamed, throwing the phone at her.

Maz caught the phone but it rattled in her hands. “He just asked how it was going?”

“Can’t you read what he really means? He’s asking if I like him or not. And I do. How stupid are you? You’re ancient and I’m just me. And I’ve figured it out.” He snatched his phone back and flopped onto the couch to eye her again.

“I don’t think that you believe that,” she said calmly. “And it seems like you have no one else to talk to about this because we haven’t had a conversation like this in a long time. Be open with your friend, Kylo. Let him know what you’re feeling and afraid of. Be clear what you’re comfortable or unsure of. You deserve to be respected. And if he wants to push you or to do things that make you feel unsteady or that you want to hurt yourself, you need to _not_ worry about losing him. It’s not about friendship at that point. Okay? You need to think about these things. And I’m always here if you want to share those thoughts with me.” Maz returned her glasses to her face and gave him a nod that released him from her aggravating questions.

The words, both his and hers, pushed him into silence and he was quiet the entire drive home. Rey fell asleep, always worn out by being thrown into the fire. He ran his hands through her hair, gently absorbing the sensation of the clean and soft strands. His parents were asking him things but he ignored them. He just nodded when they asked if it went well.

When he got home, he texted Poe four words: _I like you too._

They didn’t make him nervous or anxious. They were easy to write and send. He didn’t agonize over the message because it was so clear in his mind that this was what Poe wanted him to say. The answer came quickly with Poe replying with a smiley face that made him roll his eyes. But there was also a question that followed: _Want to hang out tomorrow after school? So you can bitch about therapy?_ _I can’t tonight cause of work._

He was in his mother’s office doorway before he could really think about it.

“Poe’s coming over tomorrow,” he said, flatly.

His mother leaned back, away from her computer to lift her glasses. “Can you maybe phrase that as a question, Ben?”

He rocked onto the balls of his feet, then back to his heels. “Can Poe stay over tomorrow night?”

“Of course. Thank you for asking. Rey is having a sleepover at Rose’s so after I drop them off, we’ll come here. But you can’t eat dinner in your room. It would be nice to get to know him more. What does he like to eat?” Leia was watching how he was moving so he stilled and shrugged.

 _Food from my plate_ , he thought to say. His mother wasn’t letting him get out of there easily. He took a few more strides into the room and sat down in the middle of the floor. It was like he did when he was still Ben; his mother would be working and he’d just come into the room to watch what she was doing, asking questions that she would answer with more patience than he deserved.

He knew what Poe ordered on the road, when they had a choice. “He likes chicken. He thinks vegetarians are pus—,” he paused awkwardly and caught the sharp look from his mother. _Give a proper reason, Ben._ “He thinks that they don’t make a good argument.”

Leia smirked at him. “You wanted to be a vegetarian when you were four.”

He let his head flop against his shoulder. “I just thought meat tasted weird.”

“Hm.” Leia sat back in her chair. “Well, I’m glad you got over it as quickly as you did.”

Kylo smiled lightly at his mother. He had insisted on not eating meat for about a week. It had felt off in his mouth somehow, no matter how much sauce or salt he put on it. Then he quickly got tired of vegetables. He ran his hand along the wooden floor, letting the memory linger.

His mother turned back to her work and he sat there for a few more minutes before getting up and going to help Rey with her homework.

-=-

 

Rey put her bag on Paige’s bed and finished telling her how Kylo was having a sleepover too.

“Don’t tell Paige,” Rose whispered back to her. “Or maybe we should tell her. She was mad at Kylo before. He’s been ignoring Liza a lot more.”

“He doesn’t talk about Liza anymore. He has Poe now,” Rey said, forcing her voice to be confident. Kylo had been upset all week and she really hoped that he’d cleared out some of his thoughts with Maz. She felt bad for falling asleep in the car but if she did, then they would be home faster. “I helped make dessert for today.”

They played with Rose’s dolls, making up pretend worlds for them to live in. Rey liked using her imagination; for so many years, it was all she had. Movies and television were still different; she wanted to like them because everyone else did. Rey’s doll was a doctor and helped people at a hospital. She made sick kids better and helped kids who were unhappy. Rose’s doll also worked in the hospital and fixed the machines for the kids. Rose said that her doll had a boyfriend and Rey said that her doll didn’t have one because she was too busy to take care of a boy. Rose reminded her that boyfriends took care of their girlfriends too and Rey stuck her tongue out at her.

Rose’s house wasn’t as neat and organized as hers and wasn’t as big. There weren’t that many books in the living room. Rey liked exploring the house with Rose, looking at family pictures. She’d stare at the pictures of Rose as a baby and try to imagine herself as being that small.

When it was finally time for dinner, Rey hadn’t thought about Kylo for almost two hours.

Paige was texting during dinner, smirking to herself until her father cleared his throat.

“Not right now, sweetheart,” Paige’s mother said.

“Are you texting Kylo?” Rey asked, finally having swallowed her mouthful of potatoes. She hated talking with her mouthful, but would sometimes forget.

Paige blushed but shook her head. “No. It’s not him. I’m sorry dad.”

Rey ate the rest of her dinner wanting to ask Paige more questions about how Kylo acted at school. She’d been to his school a few times. She wanted to see his classroom and where the teacher sat. The lockers were so much bigger and the hallways were also longer. The classrooms weren’t as colourful or happy, not like at her school. They sat in the big desks and she kicked her legs, looking at the windows. Kylo had already told her about how her school was the same one that he went to before Snoke took him. She’d sit under his tree, the one that they planted to remember him, and thought about how she’d feel if someone that she knew in the real world disappeared. Would adults tell her what was going on? She loved Kylo’s tree; it was still a part of who he was before. She wanted to get to know Ben but Kylo always said that he was gone. But the tree still had his name and would just keep growing. She hoped that it would be there forever.

They played a game that was more fun than the last time she had been at Rose’s. It had been a trivia game and it had frustrated her to the point of near tears that she didn’t know the same things as Rose or Paige. But this game was about acting out a job or actions. Rey liked pretending to build a house; she was really good and Rose’s mom got her clues quickly. She didn’t want Rose to feel bad about losing so Rey guessed wrong when Mrs Tico did her actions. Rose’s dad watched as his daughters played the game. He had small glasses and a serious face, only smiling when someone made him. Han would have been laughing or teasing her the entire time if they played this game at home.

Kylo called before it was bedtime. He sounded relaxed and let her talk about her thoughts and plans for the future. She was glad to go to bed knowing that he liked the dessert that he’d helped her make.

It was also easier to go to sleep knowing that he was feeling better.

 

-=-

 

Poe stole three haricot vert from his plate before he managed to stop him.

He hadn’t said much during dinner. He managed to answer some of the questions, just to help Poe out. He had given him several panicked looks when Han or Leia had asked him about what his parents did.

Finally, they were allowed to go to his room. He could still hear his parents finishing the dishes and slowly let the sound die as he shut the door.

Poe asked if he could hold his hand. He said yes.

They sat on the bed and Kylo launched into what he’d talked about during therapy, letting it spill out of his mouth angrily. Poe let him complain about Maz and how she overthought most of his responses to her questions or made them seem like nothing. It was always gray with her answers. She didn’t understand that his silences were better reactions than anything he said. The words still held the confusion and bitterness that he held about being ignored, and if he hated him for being the way he was: fragmented and disfigured. He didn’t hold back, disclosing his fears in a low but steady voice. Poe just nodded and gripped his hand, listening more to him with concern, but also questions in his eyes.

“You should never feel like you want to hurt yourself. Especially because of me and something stupid that I did.” Poe rubbed small circles with his thumb on the back of his hand, keeping his eyes low. “I was thinking that you’d be more mad. It’s all I could think about all week; like, why am I doing this to you. I even asked my mom, like, hey I like somebody at school who’s been through hell and back and now I’m just fucking him up more.”

“No.” Kylo shook his head. “If you hadn’t kissed me, I’d still be stuck. If you hadn’t wanted to be my friend, then nothing would have changed and I’d have stayed how I was. I’ve never told anyone how badly he ripped me up inside. It was hard to talk about what he did to everyone else but if I told him how he took my soul, then maybe it would be real. But I don’t want to be trapped there with him forever. He killed me and then tried to keep me there forever.”

Poe slowly looked up, guilt still heavy in his eyes. “I don’t want to put you through all that again. I’ve thought about how you kissed me too and it’s hard but it’s also like I said, we can just go back to how it was. Just hang out, but talk more about this. I like you, but I guess I’m like you too. I don’t want you to stop wanting me around.”

Kylo was drawn into the sorrowful feelings that were etched on Poe’s face. He was taking it all on, like it was his fault that Kylo couldn’t just be there with him. It was like with Rey. She would constantly try to take all of his sadness and put her own away. He had pulled back from her in minor ways just to give her the space to let her tell him how she was feeling. Still, his own greedy ache kept him from only focusing on her and what she needed. He would explode into recklessness if Poe took on his feelings too and stopped himself from saying what he wanted and how he felt. Fucking Maz was right.

“Poe. Just tell me what you want.” Kylo slowly lifted their joined hands and managed to lightly press his lips to Poe’s knuckle without letting panic take over. “Pretend I’m normal for five minutes.”

“You’re more normal than you think, but okay.” Poe exhaled. “I think about this way: heart and head. That's something that my mom told me and look where it got me but whatever. My heart is the one making me screw up. I want to keep kissing you, holding you. To feel your arms around me, stuff like that. The stuff that I know makes you afraid and tears me up inside and makes me want to try harder to think about what you need. That's where the head part comes in. I just want to listen to you, and have you listen to me because I don’t really talk about serious stuff to anyone. My mom tries but she’s messed up too. I guess I just want to be with you because life is shitty but also short. Who knows when my dad will want to pack up and leave and I’ve got no real say in what he does. So I guess I’m stuck too. But I’ve stopped feeling so goddamned lonely since we started being friends. I don’t want to go back to how it was before.”

Kylo tried to think like Rey and gently let go of Poe’s hand and pulled him into a hug. He felt cautious arms wrap around him in return. “I’m sorry.”

Poe laughed and pulled back. “What for?”

“For not realizing that you were lonely too in the beginning,” Kylo answered. “I just thought you were annoying.”

He shook his head, snorting a laugh. “I can be both.”

“You make it better.” Kylo sat back to stare at his friend. He’d spent last night trying to unravel why he hadn’t been more upset about Poe ignoring him. He hadn't torn the house apart, searching for answers. He’d promised that he wouldn’t go away; and he didn’t. He'd drifted in the periphery, but still there. It had taken Kylo to break the dam with kind words. He needed more kind words and more softer thoughts. The first weeks of school, two years ago, were some of the first times that he and Rey had spent apart for so many hours. It felt like forever for her and he knew that and if it weren't for his ultimate goal, he would have given into being with her rather than focusing on what he should. But they'd agreed on those priorities: graduate, get out, get a life together. He couldn’t run to her when he wanted to, and she didn’t have him to protect him. But then he saw her at the end of the day and his fear was replaced by joy. That fear was eroded by time, knowing that she really was being taken care of by his parents. They loved her too and weren’t going to make the same mistake that they made with him with her. If they did, then they really would never see him again. But those warm feelings had started to creep into his heart every time he saw or talked to Poe. He had listened to him when he had set out his darkest memory and didn’t go away.

“Make what better?” Poe asked, squinting at him, his eyes taking on Rey's tones for another brief moment. "Sorry for the stupid question but..."

Kylo cut him off. “Make it easier. You know when to be quiet when I need it, most of the time. When you are talking, you make me almost think differently or at least about other things than how I can’t figure out if I’m angry for a good reason or if I’m just mad from nothing.” He looked down at their hands again and squeezed lightly, testing how far he could go. “I didn’t want to be your friend and now I don’t know what I’d do if we went back to how it was before.”

Then Poe asked if he could kiss him again.

He beat him to it, leaning over to kiss him instead. He gripped Poe’s hands to the bed, too embarrassed to say that he was still afraid of him touching him. Still, he leaned into the kiss and let his heart be lifted by the feeling.

When they parted, Poe grinned at him.

They sat in silence for a few minutes until his father called from the living room downstairs about some movie on television that they should watch with them. Still floating, Kylo reluctantly agreed, mostly to have something to escape into. Sitting on the couch, with his parents in their chairs on either side, they watched the silly romantic comedy about people meeting in a dog park. This wasn't what his father watched when he was a kid and he gave him a long, dark look when he watched the opening scene with bright colours, plucky music, and idiotic dialogue. The lines were so easy to predict and he spent most of the movie with his eyes closed. Poe’s hand was warm against the side of his thigh, pressed as close as he dared to go. It was more engaging than the garbage on the television.

He called Rey when the main characters found their happy ending and the world could be real again. His father was snoring softly from his chair and his mother had just shook her head at him, letting them both escape into the kitchen. He was trying not to listen to Poe, speaking Spanish to his mother softly in the corner by the oven. He turned his ears towards Rey and smiled. She was filled with stories about how Rose and her were planning to work together when they were older, how they were going to take care of animals. She asked how the dessert was and he told her that it was perfect, like her. She giggled at him, making him blush. He looked up and met Poe’s eyes, burning the redness even deeper.

His mother finally sent them to bed, complaining about Han and his choice of movies. She asked Poe how his mother was and he licked his lips and said that she was fine and it was good to talk to her. He knew that Poe’s mother wasn’t at home. His Spanish was still poor, but he blamed that more on his teacher than himself for once. He had been watching Poe, trying to stay quiet but still trying not to make it seem like a secret. He had given him a soft look when their eyes had met in the kitchen and Kylo had to settle a new thought in his chest. The day had been about knowing how Poe wanted him to treat him and he knew he’d only disappoint him if he didn’t focus more.

He wanted to watch Poe change when they were upstairs in his room, but couldn’t lift his head. He pulled on an old t-shirt and decided that it was too warm for anything but boxers. He still watched Poe try to decide what to put on before finally just taking an old, faded t-shirt from his tattered bag and pulling it on.

He felt a surge of life as he hatefully flossed his teeth. Poe was frowning at him, watching the blood gather from his mouth as he spit into the sink.

“Can you help me?”

“With what?” Poe smirked. “Teach you how to floss?”

“No, help me with Spanish. I need it.” He could only meet his own eyes in the mirror, but turned to meet Poe’s in reality. He couldn’t trust what that mirror was telling him. “For the FBI.”

Poe rinsed his mouth and then gave him a grin that crept into his veins and lit up his insides. “You know, you can’t tell anyone. I’m acing Spanish right now because none of the teachers realize that I’m not Italian. Seriously, don’t tell them. Yeah, I can help you. You’re about the only person who won’t ask me for the swears and dirty words.”

His parents’ door was closed. So with fresh mouths, they shared a kiss in the washroom that Kylo wanted to go on forever.

They still watched an even dumber movie in his room, but now they were at least alone. Stretched out on their stomachs, they were watching each other more than the television.

Poe’s hand left his when someone knocked on his door.

“Goodnight, boys. Don’t stay up too late,” Leia said, when he told her it was fine to come in after internally seething for too long.

“We won’t, mom.” His answer was quick, with his head down. “Goodnight.”

The door shut again and he exhaled, annoyed again that his world was also driven by his parents.

But Poe was giving him a look that he still couldn’t read, making him frown. He raised his eyebrows, trying to keep his look neutral when curiosity was overwhelming him. “What?”

“Nothing. Just thinking about you.” Poe smiled, reaching for his hand but stopping before they touched. He took the offered palm and squeezed it, lingering in the kiss from before. The warmth of the touch made him smile again. Poe would probably have something to say about it, but today had been about letting his happiness show.

They spread out the sleeping bag, even though they were sharing the bed. He hadn’t asked, but that’s what they were doing. Poe had snickered as they set out the blue sleeping mat and Kylo reached for both of his hands, looking down at him with the waves still rocking through him. He gripped his back and pulled him closer, enjoying having the younger boy in his arms for an embrace rather than the heightened intimacy from before. When he parted he could only shake his head, trying to apologize without words for not kissing him. For once, he was able to turn out the lamp at his bedside. He still didn’t understand how Poe could look at him like he wasn’t a monster, to want to be there with him and escape from loneliness together.

“Ky, I know I’m not always going to say the right things, but I want you to let me try to handle your bad days too,” Poe finally said after they’d stared at one another for ten minutes in the quiet, dark safety of his room and each other’s arms. “And, you know, let me have bad days also.”

“I can try,” he answered, reaching up to touch Poe’s cheek. He wanted desperately to mean what he was saying. “I can really try.”

Poe leaned forward, pressing their lips together. Kylo deepened the kiss at the contact, pulling him closer to feel him fully against him. The light touches throughout the evening had left him more calm than caught up in perplexities of feelings. Holding Poe closer, he sighed into his mouth, feeling the temptation of going further start to press on him.

He stopped the panic from rising too far by breaking the kiss before it deepened beyond his control. “Stop.”

“Okay, it’s good. It’s all good.” Poe shifted away, taking his hand to steady him. “Keep telling me that.”

He nodded and looked at their hands. “Goodnight.”

“Night.” Poe didn’t look sad. Instead, he had his head on a pillow and was smiling at him.

Kylo shut his eyes and felt himself smiling as well.

 

-=-

 

The next week, Poe was back to sitting closer to him at lunch. He’d grip his leg when he was laughing at something Paige said and let the touch linger.

They managed to both skip class one morning and sat out on the bleachers, looking at the empty soccer field. The smokers had left them alone after a hateful glare from him. The beauty of being alone meant a long and heated kiss out in the open, not just inside. Kylo had told Poe how he had missed being outside when he was trapped. How he missed the sun and the wind and all of the sounds that were drowned out by terror. How much he missed baseball. He wanted to watch more of it on television but he didn’t know must of the players anymore and didn’t want to ask.

Their time together always felt short at school. Too many classes with too many different people. They had quietly volunteered for sorting through the wrestling team’s equipment. In the dark storeroom, he’d pulled Poe on top of him for the first time. The kisses grew deeper and his body still wouldn’t let him go further. He had to let his head fall forward, his hands on Poe’s hips and quietly sob that they should stop.

And he did.

No matter what happened, Poe understood him. Even though he failed at everything, he could still be lifted by creeping progress. He wasn’t stuck anymore. Just stuck a little less.

At night, when Rey had fallen asleep, he’d roll over and they’d exchange text messages about things that they could never say during the day. Kylo never really thought he’d miss anyone other than Rey, but there was a new ache growing in his heart when Poe wasn’t there. Sending messages back and forth wasn't real.

He’d write in one of his devoted journals, letting his feelings and thoughts take shape in careful and neat handwriting. He could hardly read what Poe wrote when they did homework together. It was dreadful and messy, just like his wrestling style.

It was easier to get up in the morning. In the evening, it was easier to go for a run and listen to music without feeling crushed by too many thoughts. Making dinner or baking with Rey seemed more real and easier; food wasn’t so disgusting to him anymore. He’d laugh more with her, letting her tell her stories from school without being distracted by lingering memories of death overtaking them. He could feel almost happy that other kids were content and doing things that six year olds should be doing. They should be making up games on the playground and arguing about the rules. He remembered doing that; now, it didn’t hurt to think about those times.

He talked to Rey about his childhood again, imagining that he was talking to Poe but still focused on her eyes and her small face. He was still coming back together; the two parts of him were almost aching to have two separate goals. But with Rey, she needed to know that he wasn’t always broken either. Now, his memories weren’t polished half-truths based more on emotion than reality; they were real in his mind too now. They were about how much he loved Chewie and how Lumpy was a good dog too and he didn’t mean to compare them. They were about learning how to ride a bike with Hux and laughing rather than crying when they both fell too often. They made plans for Rey to learn how to ride a bike in the summer. She was smiling brighter, or at least he saw her smile in a different way. It didn’t hurt as much to think about being six.

But, like with everything, he still had to deal with his thoughts about the evil still lingering in his veins and tainting his heart.

Poe came over another week later, looking exhausted but still smiled brightly at him when they found time to be alone. They were in the garage with the excuse of vacuuming his car. In the backseat, Poe pressed their lips together with clear desperation after carefully asking him first. He could always see his hands shaking before he set the question into the air. Kylo was the one to pull him onto his lap, soaking in the feeling of having their bodies so close together. He had made that move with determination and without thinking through how hard he was. When Poe arched against them, rubbing their erections together through their jeans, he had to gasp and felt his chest tighten until he couldn’t breathe. He turned out of the kiss and apologized before Poe could. He put his head on his shoulder as Poe hugged him, saying that it was okay. It would get better

His body wouldn’t let him have what he wanted, no matter how much he tried to fight it.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Teenage boys kissing. References to most things in the tags (mentions of self harm, rape, suicide ideation, probably something I forgot because I live this story and forget.)
> 
> Again, thanks for the lovely comments, even the critical ones are appreciated. I've got this arc almost completely written (chapters 25 and 26 are currently breaking my heart...from both Rey and Ben's sides) but I start teaching my next course next week and will have to deal with that plus research and life. But my lovely cat (even though he can be a bad boy) got very good results from the vet yesterday - his kidneys are almost normal again. Thanks again for hanging in there with me on this depressing ride.


	20. Chapter 20

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys have a weekend alone.
> 
> See chapter notes for warnings.

 

His parents were taking Rey for a weekend at Luke’s. They left early on Friday morning and he gave Rey a long hug in the doorway because she wouldn’t let him go. He didn’t want her to go away. Luke’s place would always be empty of real love. She was worried about missing school and missing him: he had heard more and more about how Rose and Finn were in ‘a fight’ and would only talk to her and not each other. He was mildly surprised that six year olds could hold grudges, but then thought about how Rey had started separating everything on her plate so the food wasn’t touching because of some off-hand remark Han had said to her a month ago. Something about how she couldn’t do it and she had to prove him wrong. He had been the same as a kid and smirked at the memory rather than wanting to snuff it out.

He also remembered her distress about the last time she’d been away for longer than an evening; but things were different now. The last month hadn’t been just school, home, and then school again. He told her as much, telling her that he’d be okay. He even gave her a poem he’d written about how he was feeling almost normal about everything in his head.

He left out the part about how it all was dwarfed by the turmoil in his head about having a weekend alone with Poe.

They skipped school after lunch and went to a movie. Poe didn’t care about his attendance and Kylo would just lie and say that he had to go to therapy. Holdo would hold his eyes, trying to break him and he wouldn’t let her win. The theatre had become a refuge for him. It was dark, it was cool, and he always knew what was going to happen. Kylo always let Poe pick what they were seeing; he really didn’t care because nothing really could hold his attention. They hadn’t truly been alone since the last road trip when this whole thing started a month ago, other than the night in his bed. Part of him felt lifted by how Poe shifted nervously in his seat at the theatre, knowing he felt the same thing.

It was a weekend without his parents.

But also without Rey.

Poe kept pressing him to tell Rey that they had a deeper friendship now. Kylo’s response was still silence. He didn’t want to keep anything from her; but it was also etched on his soul to not hurt her. He had to respect her and never treat her differently as he grew up. But part of this had to be private. He shared everything with her but this had to be just his. It was a mistake to tell Maz; that part he couldn’t take back but it only confirmed his turn towards keeping it from Rey. He would teach her about how hard it all was when she was older. She had to grow up more and by then he’d have made all the mistakes for her.

And he was slowly giving in to how good those mistakes felt.

It was still early in the evening. They’d ordered a pizza and Kylo ate more of it than Poe for once. He still tried to pick off most of his pepperoni and Kylo only smiled at him and let him take it.

Poe was resting his head on his stomach, up in his room. They had the whole house to themselves and his room was still the safest place to be. He could hear the dog pacing downstairs and he’d just been taken for a walk. He narrowed his eyes at nothing, aggravated that the dog didn’t like him as much as he liked Rey.

“We could have a party,” Poe teased. He was looking up at the ceiling and playing with his hand. He was running his fingers across his knuckles like he’d never seen a hand before.

His response was shutting his eyes and giving a purposely embellished sigh.

“Fine, no party.” He sat up and grinned at him. “It’s better just to spend time with you anyway.”

“I just told you about why I hate stairs,” he couldn’t hold back his own smile, “and you yawned three times.”

“Come on, they were yawns of agreement. And stairs are fucking awful.” Poe sat up and moved his hand towards his chest. “I know I just touched you but can I keep going?”

He’d been waiting for him to ask that. “Come here.”

Kisses felt good. Having Poe on top of him was slowly becoming even better. The way his hips moved and how his hands slid up his body made it easier to let go and drift off into why Poe could touch him and he couldn’t touch himself. He tried again that morning in the shower. He had thought about how Poe would kiss up his neck, nipping at his ear until he had to tell him to stop. He stood there under the warm water, letting the feeling go from his mind to his dick. He’d wake up some mornings half-hard already, lost in warm dreams rather than aching nightmares. He’d have to turn away from holding Rey, afraid that she felt it. He wanted release, yet his hand would shake too violently to stroke himself beyond one or two shaky brushes of his fingers against himself.

He’d punched the wall after, bitter tears coming to his eyes rather than ones of pain.

Poe sat up, sleepy eyes looking down at him. “I came up with another reason why I like you.”

“Because I’m boring?” He reached up, cupping the younger boy’s smooth face. He hadn’t really talked that much that day. There hadn’t been the same small conversations about the small doses of sadness that they had to swallow everyday. Poe hated working, hated the shitty store and his managers. Kylo imagined hating it too: being told what to do was only freeing when there was an end in sight. He’d wait to work with something that solved bigger problems other than just not being poor.

Poe also hated not being able to stand up to his dad. He’d argue with people at school, get into scraps that Kylo didn’t know about, because he’d have to see how his father beat his mother and then come after him. Kylo’s hatred for the man deepened with every conversation. He could do something about it; all Poe had to do was ask.

Kylo saved his worries for quieter moments, when Poe turned to him and shook his head, still admitting that his problems were nothing but having to deal with an asshole. His father was a drunk; he wasn’t evil. He’d never been hurt like Kylo had been.

Kylo would carve out pieces of darkness and present them to Poe with low tones and distant eyes. Lunch had turned into the two of them finding somewhere quiet away from the others and Kylo slowly bringing old wounds to the surface. Every time that he did, he expected it to finally break them both. Still, the bleak memories didn’t. How he had been forced to watch others, even younger kids than him, be held down and brutalized. Having to try to comfort them as they bled and sobbed, not understanding what had happened and why they couldn’t go to their moms and dads. Picking up a tiny finger off the basement floor and trying to remember whose it was. Being forced to stand on a broken leg and fight through the pain so Snoke wouldn’t see him be weak. Not eating for days and then still giving it to the smaller children. Being trapped in a closet and hearing him hurt Rey when he realized how much she meant to him. And everyday, being mandated to hear his insane and hateful rants and not believe them. Each story would come from any year of his life there.

And Poe would just take it in, letting him cry and crying with him.

Paige asked if they were out smoking pot and he let her believe that.

Poe took his hand, kissing his thumb and pulling him out of the thought. “I like that you let me be me, even though it annoys the shit out of you.”

“When are you somebody else?” Kylo focused on how Poe’s mouth moved on his thumb, how he lightly sucked on the tip. The pressure was starting to build in the bottom of his stomach, spreading from the double sensation of Poe’s light body and his soft lips.

“You hate stupid questions, so don’t ask ‘em. You know what I mean. You do the same thing. You don’t fool me anymore. How you act with Rey, that’s real. How you act at school, that gets a little…murky.” He paused, tilting his head. “You’re also pretty good at kissing.”

Kylo was tired of being teased, of being given lines about how he was in anyway talented with something that petrified him. He took that fear and turned it into action, reaching up to pull Poe’s mouth down to his. Hearing him moan, he kept moving. He flipped him over, onto his back and pinned him down. He ground their hips together and hissed at the sensation. It was like at practice; he was stronger and quicker but Poe could match him if he really needed to.

Taking command, holding the younger boy down, sent shivers through his veins. He could feel how his insides crossed over one another, the overlapping getting stronger as he pushed his tongue into Poe’s mouth. Poe’s hands were in his hair, squirming underneath him and sighing in small exhales. Then Poe’s hands were pulling him closer before reaching down to tug at his shirt.

He didn’t think he could get closer to bliss, but he was almost there. He had control. He could do this. His mouth pressed harder, demanding more from the boy beneath him. His lower body wasn’t working but he still tried to force it into listening to him.

As Poe’s fingers caressed his bare stomach, the jolts, the shivers, the lightening arched in his body. They blossomed into a flash that blinded him behind his closed eyes. The weight in his groin imploded into the light of a star and he groaned as his mind left his body.

When he snapped back to himself, he felt a warm dampness in his jeans.

Poe was still kissing him, touching him.

“Stop, stop,” he ripped his mouth away to gasp. “Get off. Get off!”

He wasn’t moving fast enough so Kylo knocked him aside as he sat up.

He couldn’t breathe.

His skin itched with the revolting moistness. Disgust rolled over him and he followed the feeling.

He was going to be sick.

He was repulsive.

He was wrong.

Snoke told him that this was going to happen. Giving into his body, tasting another boy’s mouth, he was just as bad as him.

Scrambling away, he gripped his hand over his mouth and scrambled for the washroom, barely making it before he vomited.

He let himself feel every retch, every thrust of nausea, jab into his body like a dull knife in his side.

A cold cloth on the back of his neck. Kind words without touches. The room slowly spun back from nothing when he sat back.

“It’s okay, Ky. It’s okay.”

An angry glare. “It’s not fucking okay! Look at me. I’m not…” A broken sob. “You shouldn’t like me. You can’t even touch me without…”

Poe was kneeling beside him, shaking his head. “Ky, it fucking happens. You’re still…I’ll slow down. Okay? You have to trust me. I trust you. I know you’ll never hurt me.”

Pushing away from the toilet, he wiped at his mouth. “I want this so bad. And I can’t have it.”

Poe brought the damp towel to his face, wiping at the sweat on his forehead. “We’ll figure it out. Go slower. Or stop. You were sick right now. We can stop and I won’t get mad.”

Kylo put his head back, rolling it along his shoulders. “How many times have you done this before?”

“What, make out and come in my pants? I don’t really keep count.” Poe brushed their hands together, seeming to not care how sickening he was. “But it happens. It doesn’t make us anything more than just…really turned on. By each other.”

He slowly turned, seeing the same mess taint the front of Poe’s jeans as well. Meeting his eyes, he watched redness start to stain the other boy’s cheeks.

“I, um, felt and heard you when you…yeah, and I was just…gone. Lost it.” Poe’s eyes darted away and he shifted his weight, avoiding reality.

“Ejaculated.” He cut through the metaphor with a flat, annoyed tone.

The redness thickened. “If we’re in sex ed, yeah. But here, maybe we just took the edge off.”

Putting his head in his hands, he forced all of the air in his lungs through his nose. “I don’t want to be uncomfortable about this. You’re not pushing me, but I’m pushing myself. I don’t like not being in control. Especially over my body.”

He heard Poe nod and then stand. The toilet flushed and he could feel Poe looming over him. Looking up, he watched him work through the problem in his head. “You’re in control, Ky. I should never have kissed you without asking, but after you told me what happened to you, I really shouldn’t have. This whole thing, what we’re doing, we can stop and I won’t stop being your friend. The last month, you’ve told me so many things and I get why you think you’re dead. I’d kill him again for you guys if I could, if I could do something that would erase those fucked up years. What he did to you is so awful and I can’t stop thinking about it. I want to make it better and I’m fucking it up. I…this would probably be easier for you if I didn’t….” Poe dropped his head, “want you so much.”

Want. Need. He didn’t think he could feel those things until Poe had kissed him about a month ago. And he had to deal with them now because they weren’t going away. They were just getting stronger.

He pushed himself to his feet and grunted at how shameful and sticky his jeans felt. “We need to shower.”

Poe’s eyes were still low and he nodded. Kylo had to reach to grab his arm when he quickly tried to flee the washroom.

“Ky. I can’t shower with you. You can’t even shower with people at school so please don’t push yourself like this. Don’t make me do this to you.” Poe exhaled and shook his head. “It’ll be too much.” Poe tried to turn again and he pulled back. “Come on, let me go.”

He dropped his hand but still shook his head. “I want you too.”

Trapped in the doorway, almost in the hall, he heard Poe mumble to himself before shifting back towards him. “I really fucking like you.”

He nodded and undid his pants, sliding them off and tossing them towards the laundry basket. Removing his shirt, he let Poe see his scars. Undoing the armband and his watch, he was eyeing the other boy as he traced the lines on his body. He’d seen most of this before, so it was strange to see him hold his breath from across the expanse of the washroom.

Turning, Kylo hid his shaking hands by twisting the knobs to bring the shower to life. He couldn’t let this beat him. He kept his eyes forward, not wanting to know if Poe had left or not.

He tugged off his ruined boxers and stepped over the bathtub’s ledge and behind the shower curtain.

His own beating heart kept him from hearing anything until the curtain parted.

 

-=-

 

The washing machine thudded into the next cycle, the water rushing out into hidden pipes and drains. Their jeans started spinning rapidly, destroying the last of what had happened an hour ago. The rest of it was already gone, down a different drain upstairs.

“Ky?” Poe’s voice was soft. He was leaning against him in a borrowed pair of his old pyjamas. He hadn’t worn them since he was fourteen. When they’d dressed upstairs, he’d teased Poe that maybe he’d have better luck in Rey’s closet. He wanted to say something to break the silence that had fallen around them after the shower. Poe had mock punched him, calling him an asshole. But the pyjamas were comfortable; he remembered that. They were some of the first clothing that he realized that he liked when he came home.

Poe was resting against his shoulder, sitting next to him across from the laundry machines in the basement. They’d both avoided really speaking until now, the washing machine an excuse to evade discussing what happened in the shower.

He’d seen Poe naked before, but he hadn’t openly seen him in the same way. The height difference was clearer now; it wasn’t like when they were lying down and things were even. Poe was younger than he was by a little over a year. Smaller, more compact. Less legs and arms. They both had only a light spread of chest hair, an awkward reminder that they weren’t anywhere near being adults.

Nothing had really happened. They studied each other, under the warm stream of the shower, before Kylo turned and started scrubbing his skin. He washed away the itch from his crotch and sighed in greedy satisfaction about being clean. But he was also half hard again.

Poe saw it. He saw the reaction. He’d felt Poe’s erection before. That’s why they were in this situation because he couldn’t handle it. But seeing it then made the sensation seem more real, still. He didn’t have control either. They had both came for each other. They’d taken the edge off. It was okay. He wanted it to be.

But they didn’t touch one another, other than to awkwardly switch places so Kylo wasn’t the only one showering.

They let the water run until it wasn’t warm anymore, sitting in opposite corners of the bathtub. There was a mess of water on the floor and their feet were the only parts touching.

“Ky?” Poe asked again and he looked away from the swirling clothing. “I know I talk a lot but I’ve never been this far either with another guy. I mean, yeah, maybe a little further but I don’t know what I’m really doing either. It just feels good so I go for it. And it feels good to have you in control. That this is more yours than ours.”

Kylo knew his look darkened because Poe bit his lip in response. His response was cold. “You already know I’m not a virgin.”

“Kylo, you were hurt in the worst way. I don’t know how that feels or what it would do to me. I’m just trying to be here for you, to let you know that what _we’re_ doing right now is the same for me.” Poe gripped his hand as he spoke. “I...What happened before, it’s happened to me but never with someone like you. I think I’d be more scared if it was anyone but you.”

Kylo nodded, still doubting most of what he’d just said.

“I’ve been dead for years. If it weren’t for you and Rey, I’d want to stay that way.” He stared at the washing machine. “Rey needs to grow up normal and I won’t be able to help her if I feel like this all the time. What happens the next time I want everything to stop again?”

He could feel Poe’s eyes but didn’t meet them.

“Ky, I…when was the last time you talked to someone about this?” His voice was soft, hardly rising above the clunking machine. "Someone that wasn't me."

“I don’t remember.” He shook his head, covering up the lie by shifting his eyes. “I’m supposed to tell Rey everything and now I’m not keeping that promise. She can’t know how fucked up I am. She sees that I’m sad and angry, and tries to fix it. I’m making her so serious, like she has to be perfect. She already is perfect. When she figures it out, she might stop loving me and I’d be alone.”

A shaky breath. “She’ll never stop loving you. And I’ll be there for you too. I’m not perfect either, Kylo, and I don’t want to be. I suck at everything that doesn’t involve math and I talk too much. I’m mad a lot of the time too and turn it into stupid jokes or bad flirting. But I want to listen to you. No matter what happens with us, if you think I’m mad at you or if…whatever…you can always call me and I’ll listen. If it means anything, I don’t think that you’re dead. You’re alive and just figuring it out.”

Kylo slowly turned, finally meeting his friend’s eyes.

Poe kissed his cheek and then put his head back down. 

He nodded. It needed to be quiet. He needed to think.

The washing machine wouldn’t run forever.

 

-=-

 

“Ben can’t know that Luke bought that motorcycle.” Leia shook her head and sighed, turning to look out the car window. “And don’t look at me like that, Han. You’re not allowed to get one either.”

“Come on, Leia. It’s just a motorcycle. Maybe he’d like it. It would be something else he could focus on,” Han replied and Rey couldn’t help but smile. “He needs more hobbies. Team sports are out the window. Writing is good for him. He also likes watching me work on the car when he’s bored enough. It would be something to do other than skip school and go to the movies with his friends.”

Rey still didn’t understand that much about Uncle Luke. He had moved closer to them again, but it seemed like it wasn’t going to stay that way. His apartment was still half in boxes, like he was planning to go somewhere. It smelled almost like Snoke’s the first time she stepped in and asked if she could sit outside for a while. Dad sat with her, in the red hallway, holding her hand and going through her breathing. Kylo had taught her that and she had taught dad. It was fair. But when she finally found herself again, she got to see that it was just Luke’s not-lived-in apartment and nowhere else. Rey only knew about moving from television and movies. The fake people there would have to move away or into a new house. Other fake people would be sad because their friends were going away, somewhere far from them. She knew that the same thing would happen with Kylo when he had to go to college. Han and Leia had talked about that earlier on the drive home, when they thought that she was asleep. They were already worried about him moving away and being on his own, how his moods could change and how he’d just lock everyone else out. Rey knew that Kylo wouldn’t be alone because she’d be there with him one day.

Leia’s phone was in her lap, but she’d shut the sound off to her headphones to listen to their worries about their son. They didn’t have to be nervous about him being alone because Poe was there. Kylo’s writing had been about her, but she knew that he would be taken care of.

The houses started to look familiar and Rey grinned to herself. Lumpy would be happy to see her and so would Kylo. She was hungry, lunch long forgotten. They’d get to order food. It wasn’t as much fun as making it, but it took less time.

“Should we have called the boys?” Leia sounded like she wanted to say that earlier, but waited until it was too late. “Who knows what they’re doing.”

Han shrugged. “Reading. Watching movies. Playing video games. What was the last one that he wanted but didn’t want to ask for? Went around pouting for a week until Rey told us what the problem was. What I wouldn’t give to read his mind like she does. Leia, they probably destroyed something and tried to hide it, badly. I was a teenager once too and as long as they didn’t drink too much of my booze, then I don’t really care. It’s Ben — they wouldn’t have a party. Maybe the girls came over and helped them clean up whatever they broke. Rey says that they talk about things that he’ll probably never talk to us about. It was good for him. I thought he’d never get over Armitage and this kid, he seems messed up too but maybe that’s what makes them tight.”

Leia shook her head, but Rey nodded. They probably did break something or had made a mess somewhere. Kylo’s room was very clean and neat; he hated mess there but everywhere else in the house was fair game for him to destroy or put into chaos. Except for her room; that place was also special and just hers.

She also wondered if they kissed while she was gone.

“Rey, sweetie, you’re kicking the seat a little hard,” Leia said to her and Rey realized she’d been swinging her legs too hard. She pulled off the headphones and yawned, handing Leia back the phone. The video wasn’t even that fun to watch anyway. She’d rather have been drawing but it was too hard in the car. “Have you thought about what you want to eat?”

Food was a good distraction. Good food. Something yummy. She would usually wait to ask Kylo want he wanted but the memory of him kissing someone who wasn’t her kept from thinking about him for once.

“Yeah. Can we get Chinese food? From the good place and not the bad one?” Rey quickly shoved her hands under her thighs to keep her legs in place.

“They’re all bad,” Han mumbled as they pulled into the garage. The door started to roll shut behind them and Rey sighed at the familiar sound of home. “Hopefully he remembered to walk the dog.”

“Of course he did, dad,” Rey answered, undoing her seatbelt to follow them out of the car. “Poe likes Lumpy too.”

“He actually seems like the type of boy who’d be afraid of dogs,” Leia said, retrieving their suitcases from the trunk. She seemed to think too hard about how to put Poe into the picture. Rey had overheard mom and dad talking about how they needed to do something for him, how it seemed like he never wanted to go home. It was like Kylo had said. Kylo always thought that people were either good or bad. But then there are the people in between who couldn’t do anything.

Rey had shrugged on her backpack and nodded. She knew him better than mom but still didn’t see why it was important. “He is, but not ours. His lito has a big mean dog in Mexico that he’s really afraid of. He wants Kylo to go with him to visit in the summer and said I could come too.”

“We’ll talk about that later, okay?” Han said. “I really promise, so don’t let me forget.”

She had heard other parents make similar assurances on the playground or at the store and always wondered why both Han and Leia said things like that. They had so much to think about so Rey had to remind them. It was just something she had to do. It was like helping with the dishes or sweeping the floor. If she did it without being asked, then everyone was happy and could have a good day.

Rey trailed after mom and dad as they walked into the house, but shot by them the moment her shoes and jacket were put away.

“Kylo?” She called, stepping up the entrance steps and into the kitchen. Her socked feet felt comfortable on the familiar floor.

She heard Leia swear about many piles of paper towels left forgotten and wet on the counter. The suitcases stood in the doorway and Lumpy ran into the kitchen from the other room. He gave her damp kisses and she had to laugh, hugging him closer.

“See, he’s tired,” she said, looking up. “They played with him.”

Grabbing Lumpy by the collar, she let him guide her to the living room.

The boys were asleep on the couch, wearing pyjamas. She recognized the ones that Poe wore as Kylo’s old set from years ago. She hadn’t seen them in a long time but still thought about how soft they were.

Kylo stirred at her footsteps and he blinked awake. She was still thinking about the pyjamas and had missed how they had felt when they were sleeping against one another, safe in Kylo’s bed. Kylo liked to sleep, but he always needed it to be without too many thoughts. That’s how Rey felt too. Sometimes she’d worry too much about forgetting the other kids, or worry that shadows could become real and hurt her. Her dreams still weren’t clean; she’d put her head against Kylo’s chest at night and try to picture happy and good things. What she’d get him for Christmas. What she’d do in school the next day. Sometimes, it would be just being grown up already so she wouldn’t have to worry about school and Christmas and the embers of terror that were still burning in the corners of her mind.

Poe lifted his head from Kylo’s shoulder and sat up too, giving her a sleepy smile. He blinked his eyes, bracing his hand on Kylo’s leg before quickly pulling away to stretch.

“Hey, you guys are back already,” he said. Kylo was avoiding looking at her, turning off the forgotten movie on the television.

“Yeah, it got too boring there. Well, not really. Mom wanted to go. She got upset at something Uncle Luke said. We had to stay at a hotel because Uncle Luke doesn’t have a couch. He doesn’t have anything but I think he likes it that way,” she tried to smile as big as she could as she hopped up onto the couch. “But I got to swim in the pool there so it was really fun. There were waterslides and I went down the tallest one without dad.”

Kylo gave her a soft look of regret that he hadn’t been there to help her if it was scary, but she wasn’t scared of real things. “I told them that he wouldn’t have a couch or extra beds.”

Leia called to them from the kitchen and she heard them both groan. She giggled to herself at the reaction. They should be more like her and not make messes.

Kylo leaned against the kitchen island as Leia asked what they had done in the kitchen. She wasn’t angry, but she looked tired. Rey wanted to apologize for them; if she’d been there, then it wouldn’t have happened. It was something about making breakfast that morning and how they’d forgotten about it. And then they forgot about it again at lunch. Poe was talking the most, apologizing and saying that they’d just ran out of time. They’d been out with the dog, then wanted to finish their homework and watch a movie.

“Those are good excuses,” Han said. “But did you touch my booze?”

Poe’s eyes got wide and he shook his head.

“He’s joking. And his jokes are bad,” Leia quickly added. “Rey and I are going to take the dog for a walk. She missed him. Order some food and set the table and finish cleaning this up, please. It’s your house too. That room upstairs is yours, but this is really your house. And why are you in pyjamas? Have you been wearing them all day?”

"All weekend." Kylo shrugged. “We got dirty. We needed to wash our clothes.”

Rey looked at Kylo with puzzlement. _You never wash clothes._

He smirked at her. _That doesn’t mean I don’t know how to do it. It was a good weekend, Rey. I hope you had fun too. I missed you._

 _Missed you too_.

If he’d missed her, he could have called at least once while she was gone.

She helped Leia attach Lumpy’s leash and reluctantly put on her light jacket. It wasn’t that cold out and she wouldn’t get sick from a little fresh air. It was still early in the evening, but Rey liked every time of day. Even late at night, when things were dark, there would always be a light and someone to protect her.

They were taking the shortcut through the alley when she heard what she thought was a sob coming from mom. Rey paused, concern gripping her as she took her hand. Had Kylo really made too big of a mess? Was she also worried that something serious had happened that they were hiding? Then, Rey heard it with more clarity, her small ears twisting to adult tones. Leia was laughing.

Rey giggled too, but still asked what was funny.

“I’m just happy, Rey. We went away for the weekend and the worst thing that happened was that they left paper towels everywhere. There was no fighting. There were no phone calls that there had been some argument or that he was upset. They were just…teenagers for the weekend. He was just a kid, hanging out in pyjamas. There haven’t been fights at school. He talks to us more. I don’t think it will ever be perfect for him, but now I feel relieved that I was worried for nothing.” Leia squeezed her hand. “I’m sorry, Rey. I didn’t mean some of that. You both are allowed to be upset. We’ll never tell you not to be. But seeing him have a friend again who makes him relax is a very good thing. Especially if he feels like he can talk to him about what he’s going through.”

“Kylo really likes him,” Rey said, feeling the ache from keeping a secret press on her stomach. “They talk a lot, sometimes about stuff that me and Kylo talk about.”

Leia nodded, still holding her hand. Her steps slowed for a moment. “Are you worried that he’s not making time for you? That this is a bad change?”

Rey quickly shook her head. It wasn’t bad. She had made up her mind a month ago, even though Kylo hadn’t told her what exactly was happening. He was so good at explaining things but this went left unsaid. “I’m okay, mom. I…sometimes I can think about things that aren’t him. I have my friends too. Rose lets me draw pictures that her mom thinks are scary, but Rose says that her mom’s a fart.”

“Really? A fart?” Leia laughed again. Rey’s ears burned at saying something so silly and she straightened her shoulders, trying to remind herself that she shouldn’t say things like that. “I’ll have to talk to her about that. Do you want to have more sleepovers with Rose? And with Finn? We can always ask. They like you too.”

“Maybe,” Rey shrugged. “I like having friends. I have school and dance class, and gymnastics. I meet people all of the time and like finding the nice ones. And Kylo needs them too, the nice people.”

 _Is it okay for him to kiss his friends?_ The question burned in Rey’s mind but she pushed it down again. If it was something important, Kylo would tell her.

 

-=-

 

Poe couldn’t stay the night. Rey was sitting at the top of the stairs, watching them say goodbye as night set in within their house. They’d both changed into their wrinkled clothes, left too long in the cool drier. But Kylo still let him keep the pyjamas. He handed them to the other boy and they held each other’s eyes and Poe finally nodded.

Han drove him home. She and Kylo were finally alone. Mom was in the home office, catching up on the work that she’d missed on Friday. Rey didn’t really like going to mom’s work. It was too stressful, with too many people always walking too fast. But the home office was a nice place of peace. She’d give her old paper to draw on, filling the opposite side of something demanding and adult with colourful pictures of life and imagination.

“Leia’s happy he’s your friend,” Rey said. She liked sitting at the top of the stairs. She could see the entire house and could picture everyday that they’d spent there.

Kylo met her eyes as he climbed the stairs. He didn’t look upset that Poe was gone. He just looked tired. He had blinked several apologies for forgetting about her, but she wanted them in real words now. Instead, there was another question. “Are you?”

“Yeah,” Rey grinned, trying not to act confused. “It makes me happy that you’re happy.”

He sat down next to her, looking down at the darkened kitchen. “I’m sorry I forgot to call you. I really shouldn’t have forgotten that. I thought about you the whole time. It was like I was talking to you a lot of the time so I thought I was…just talking to you. We were talking. A lot.”

She put her hand on his and made him look at her. “About there?”

Gazing down at her hand, he bit his lip. “He understands. I don’t know how, but he understands what happened to us. Or at least he’s really good at trying to understand. He’s got problems too. And I like hearing about them. I’m trying to make sure that it’s fair. I didn’t listen to Hux enough and now he hates me. I can’t do that to Poe.”

“I’ve seen him sad too. He can be sad around me. I told him.” Rey was getting tired and a yawn escaped her mouth. “Can we go to bed now?”

He kissed her forehead, letting his lips linger. He was quiet for a few moments, resting his head against hers. “Yeah. Let’s go.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yep. More teenage boys kissing, references to rape, suicide, and murder. Thanks for reading :)


	21. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey's demons start to rise. And Kylo deals with a new problem at school. The kids share a night alone with consequences. See chapter notes for warnings.

Rey sometimes forgot her nightmares. Sometimes they would disappear when she woke up, but other times they’d stay with her all day. It had been that way for the last two years, when she’d stopped living in a nightmare and just had to deal with them. Sometimes she would see Anja’s face in a hallway, her arms hanging limp at her sides; she would scream for help but no one heard it but her. She wouldn’t be able to focus at school and grew more and more frustrated until the classroom helper took her to sit somewhere else, somewhere where she could think. Her mind would clear and the present would be right where she left it.

But just when she thought they were getting better, they would happen again.

Kylo would be there to help her, but he couldn’t be with her at school. And now that he was driving on his own more often, they’d have less time together. He was fighting for independence, not to get away from her; that’s what he would say with his eyes when they fell asleep together at night. But on the mornings when she had nightmares that she remembered, he’d ride with her and keep her safe until they were apart.

She felt like the time that they spent together was less, but the way that Kylo spoke and acted was more even important. He wasn’t zoning out as often; he’d spend more time reading or texting, but he wasn’t in his head as much. Crying to him felt easier. He’d hold her and she wouldn’t feel like he was reverting back towards hitting bottom.

Sometimes she could ignore the shadows and ghosts that followed her at school. Those things were all in her head. Maz would tell her that they’re still important, that they mean something, but the things that mattered the most were what was happening now and how she kept moving forward. Everything was supposed to take time and she had to make the images seem less frightening. But to Rey her legs were still too short so her feet couldn’t make big enough steps.

She was forgetting the other children more and more. That’s where her feet were taking her. The people around her now, her friends, filled up her life and made her days mostly happy.

Kylo made her happy, when he was happy. When he was sad or upset, she would have to try harder to be happier for him. But that also made him feel guilty. Climbing into their bubble and floating away together was something that Rey depended on everyday, even when she was looking for other people to help or to help her. The world was too big to just have one person. Mom and dad would always be there too. And Kylo had her, but Poe too.

But sometimes, Rey just thought about what she didn’t have.

The last few weeks were making her not want to talk again.

The argument with the other kids at the spring concert had made it all clear to her. They were supposed to perform two dances. She had practiced extra hard, ignoring how her costume itched when she moved. She’d always squirm and the teacher would ask her if she had to use the washroom. She would leave practice and enjoy having her leotard off for those few minutes. It itched worse than panties did. But she had to do it. She had to practice more, like Kylo did with his training.

Mom and dad got him a weight set for the basement for the anniversary. They didn’t say it was for that day, but they couldn’t forget it and the world wouldn’t let them either. A journalist followed them home from school one day and they had to get a police car outside of their house. It was better if he just spent time in the basement. She could hardly lift some of the weights, but he looked at the set with intense eyes and clenched hands. She got to practice her dancing with him and he always flopped on the couch with her, letting her wipe the sweat from his forehead.

Agent Jinn came to see them that week, the week of the anniversary, a week before the concert. Kylo showed him his report cards and wrestling score sheets, exploding with excitement over seeing him for the first time in so many years. He let Kylo take over the conversation over dinner. It was all about progress for Kylo then. He had practiced with her and Poe in his room, what he wanted to say and do when Agent Jinn was there. His eyes disappeared into his head and the words that he was emphasizing repeatedly. Poe had given Rey a long look of concern, then his arms folded across his chest. _Yeah, sounds good, Ky._ Kylo’s eyes narrowed at him then, studying the words like he didn’t believed them. Poe challenged him with raised eyebrows, before they shared a look that Rey didn’t see anyone share with Kylo before except for her.

Poe had the same look at the dinner, being the quietest one at the table for once. He had shaken the agent’s hand, looking at Kylo intently during the introduction and then spent most of the dinner looking like he wanted to disappear.

Rey sat next to Agent Jinn, holding his hand. He had big hands, ones that had helped save them and protect other children and other people. She wanted to listen to what he was saying, but touching and being quiet felt better. She ran her hand on the golden band that stood out on his finger and ran her hand along the ridges.

He couldn’t come to the spring concert. Rey felt bad for asking, but he looked like he really meant it. He was only there for a couple of days and had work to do. But he was really sorry. His eyes said that more than his words. She knew that he asked about her; Kylo would tell her.

She gave him the pictures that she’d been drawing of the other kids, to help their parents. Leia had stopped talking that much about the group for the parents of the murdered kids. It felt strange to Rey when she realized it. But Agent Jinn had nodded firmly at Rey that she was always helping with her memories if she focused on how much the children meant to their parents: how they died needed to be put in the past. He had put the pictures in his bag, telling her that she was doing so much by continuing to move forward too. She’d added more details about what she could remember before she forgot.

Thinking about forgetting always made her underwear feel more itchy.

It was strange to get ready for the concert. Other kids would be singing, but they’d be dancing. Kylo put on a crimson red sweater, turning to ask her if it looked okay. It was a little tight, his arms stretching the fabric. But she still said that it looked nice. At least it wasn’t black.

He looked like he wanted to say something else, but they were going to be late.

She was already dressed in her sparkly outfit, but squirmed in the backseat of the car.

They were the third group to perform and Emily was crying. She was whining to their instructor that her grandmother had come from far away, real far away, to see her perform for the first time. And she wasn’t allowed to take pictures. She didn’t understand why and Rey felt her face getting hot, knowing that she’d been the reason why. Han and Leia had talked to her after they spoke with Agent Jinn before he left, before she went upstairs to sleep with the boys. The interest in the case always spiked at that time of the year, Jinn had said. People would be looking for pictures of Rey and Kylo. The same people that ran the websites about them, which drove Kylo into aggressive and silent anger, would be looking for them.

So, no pictures during the concert for their group. Everyone had to sign a form. But could a piece of paper really stop people?

They could have their own pictures, for memories, but don’t share them.

Emily deserved to be upset, but it wasn’t Rey’s fault, even though it was her problems that had brought them to that point.

“If I don’t go, they can take pictures,” Rey whispered, grabbing her instructor’s hand. It was a constant stream of kids, parents, and dance teachers. It would have been overwhelming if her insides weren’t screaming at her to do something.

Her instructor knelt down, her curly blonde hair flopping into her face. “You don’t have to do that, Rey. There are other kids in our group that can’t have their pictures taken too. Other parents have signed those sheets too. This isn’t your fault.”

“But it means so much to Emily.” She gripped her teacher’s hand more. “Please. I don’t want to do it now.”

The first group’s music started and Rey knew that she was running out of time. Her teacher led her out of the area behind stage and down the short stairs into the hallway. This was her normal school, but it looked so much different at night, with so many different people around. The shadows were heavier and more demanding, making every corner looking more menacing.

“Can I talk to Kylo?” Her voice came out in a whine.

“Your brother? Yes. I’ll go get him. Wait here.” Her instructor was nice, but didn’t understand everything.

She left her sitting on a bench in the hallway, by herself. The lights were dim there and she drew her legs under her chin. The costume would get wrinkled, but she didn’t care.

She heard Kylo’s shoes before she saw him. She looked up and he knelt beside her.

“Don’t do that, mom will…” she started to say and then her voice stopped working. She whimpered and he pulled her into his arms. “You’ll get dirty.”

“I’m already dirty,” he mumbled. He’d touched the side of the car earlier and had bit the inside of his cheek hard. “We’ll wash them when we get home. But forget about that.”

He didn’t need to ask what was wrong. She’d tell him anything. “Everybody hates me because they can’t take pictures.” She forced out the words, knowing the tears were already ruining her makeup. “Emily was upset.”

“Is Emily everybody? She’s not even your friend Rey.” Kylo sat back, smoothing her hair. “She’s also the worst dancer in the group. And it’s important that you’re protected. This is for your future not hers. No one is allowed to take pictures of me at wrestling. And I don’t want that for other reasons.”

She managed to giggle at his tone. He’d been at almost every one of her dance practices, doing homework and waiting with Paige. Poe snuck in once, laughing with them both about something that she couldn’t hear until the teacher told them to be quiet. She turned away and when she looked back, it was just Paige sitting and reading a book. They were only gone for a few minutes, but it was Kylo alone who returned. Paige said something to him and he just grinned before looking up at her with bright eyes. He watched her do a step perfectly and smiled at her. Even when he wasn’t there, he was still thinking about her.

Those same eyes were looking at her right then and his face softened when she laughed. He also saw through her fear, touching her shoulder and leaning closer. “You don’t have to be afraid of messing anything up. You don’t have to be perfect all the time. Don’t be like me. I’m…I didn’t mean to make you like this. But you get mad when I’m worried about being…upset too.”

She couldn’t help it, but she did try to listen. She tried to learn from him because that’s what he wanted. He’d beat himself up for losing, driving himself harder the next time. She never thought that Kylo would let himself give up, but he did stumble quite often.

Maybe this was her turn.

She heard her instructor start to pace down the hall and quickly switched to blinking.

 _I’m scared. I’m scared to mess up in front of everyone._ She bit her lip and shook her head. _I told Maz I could do this and now I don’t think I can._

 _You’ve worked hard for this, so I think that you deserve to be there. I can stand backstage. I can stand where you can see me. You can’t see anyone when you’re on the stage. Remember that we checked? But if you can see me, you can go out there and show off all of the hard work that you’ve done._ He was holding her hand, repeating what he had offered earlier. She’d said no then. But now, she needed him.

_You won’t feel dumb? Standing there?_

_No, because then I’d be with you._

Kylo took her hand and her instructor turned to look at them.

“Ready, Rey? Is your brother coming with you?”

They’d told her so many times that they weren’t brother and sister. They were more than that.

He stood backstage, watching her with his head tilted. He wasn’t anywhere than with her.

Her performance wasn’t perfect, but being with him there was a better feeling.

 

-=-

 

Kylo had always thought his life would end by Snoke’s cruel treatment or by his own hand. The former thought had been pushed away over time, but he still knew that part of what Snoke had forced him to do was always lingering within him. Ending his own life, however, had also subsided into a minor bruise in the back of his mind. It had been almost two months since the urge to even harm himself had bubbled to the surface.

But now his wanted to be absorbed into the atmosphere when Mrs Yaddle decided he would be partnered with Hux for the last major project of the term: a paper and a presentation. Having to work together. And he couldn’t work on his own, like he usually craved and demanded as prudently as he could. Mrs Yaddle, with her caring eyes and calm voice, would usually let him do what he wanted.

But not this time.

They didn’t look at one another. Kylo could only see how Hux mirrored his dejection. It had to happen at some point. Why _now_? Kylo renewed his hatred for the world in that instant. He only had one class with Poe and they could never work together. Next year, they’d already decided that they’d be lab partners from the beginning. But this year, he had to deal with this.

Even as they both slowly turned and shifted to desks closer to one another, he wanted to flee from the room and be done with school. But another part of him, the one that was mostly hushed, kept him grounded: finish school, get out.

The classroom was filled with voices of others talking. It was always random chatter that would normally cause him close down and focus on his breathing. Now, he could only focus on the silence.

Hux sneered as he sat next to him. “Why now.”

“Why now what?” Kylo snapped. “I didn’t steal your fucking girlfriend.”

Liza had even pulled away from him slightly at that point. He would pointedly only talk to Poe at lunch and ignore her, but then he’d catch the hurt in Paige’s eyes and would have to listen to some story about a nail salon or shopping or how great her dad was. One time, one lunch period, a thick feeling made his chest tighten when Poe reached out to look at the designs etched onto Liza’s nails. She smiled brightly at him, explaining how it had taken an hour to get them all done. With his hand still on Liza’s, Poe shot him a look with a wink that took him a moment to understand. He let go of the apprehension that had claimed him then when he unravelled the look: _I’m just trying to get along with her; this is a boring-ass story_. He’d stopped calling her a bitch to her face mostly because Paige would get upset.

They never saw how they’d brush hands after lunch, before parting for the afternoon block of classes. They never saw stolen kisses in empty hallways before leaving for home.

Now, the last person he’d ever tell was looking at him with dark eyes and impatience.

“That’s not the problem…uh. Um, okay. Fuck. Let’s just…how many weeks do we have to work on this?” Hux shoved the paper away and rubbed his eyes. He looked tired. Kylo instantly pushed the thought away; he couldn’t feel sympathy for Hux. Never.

But the knot in Kylo’s stomach tightened. “Three.”

“Great. Just great.” Hux rubbed his eyes. He hated him this much; he couldn’t stand to work with him for the project either. Kylo only hated him as a reaction. They had their childhood. That part had only been tainted by what had happened afterwards. “Let’s…go work in the library. I can’t think right now, can you?”

Kylo almost wanted to smirk, seeing how uncomfortable the redhead was. “No.”

“Mrs Yaddle? Can we go to the library?” Hux raised his voice over the other questions from the class. He got a firm _yes_ and they gathered up their books. Kylo was just grabbing random things. They probably weren’t the right ones.

Paige’s eyes burned into his as he left the room, trailing after his former friend. He kept that thought with him as they ended up in the library. His legs didn’t get him there, but he was somehow in their dingy library. Middles schoolers were crowded around the computers, giggling about something. The librarian was moving around, her cart squeaking as she returned books to their spots. It would all have been boring on a normal day but he wanted just to focus on the random background noise rather than what he wanted to do. Hux sat down heavily and glared at him before looking at the assignment again.

“It’s not that hard. Why did she give us three weeks?” His former friend put his head in his hands and leaned heavily against the brightly coloured table. “How are you going to stand this?”

Kylo wrinkled his nose as he sat down across from him. It was three weeks because they would have other work at the same time. Didn’t Hux see that? “You’re the one who hates me.”

Hux exhaled and pretended to read the sheet again. “It…it’s not my fault.”

The stupid project forgotten, Kylo stood from the table. “Of course it’s your fault,” he hissed.

Hux’s pale cheeks reddened as he glanced around at all of the nervous faces around them. The middle schoolers sat up, staring at them and hoping for a fight. He heard the librarian setting down books heavily against her desk, but he didn’t react.

“Sit down, Kylo. Let’s work on this. Or at least start working on it,” Hux started. “And it is my fault. I’m…sorry.”

It came out in a stutter and Kylo sat down, glaring at the redhead. “You don’t mean that.”

Hux closed his eyes and leaned back. Kylo could see the stray blonde hairs on his cheeks, where he’d missed shaving. Of course he couldn’t get that right.

“You’ll never believe me. So just…come on. Look at the assignment sheet and stop glaring at me so I know what we need for the next part.” Hux was talking and he followed the orders but his eyes were always glancing at his face. “Okay, we need to finish an outline for today…um…”

The period couldn’t end soon enough.

 

-=-

 

Poe was waiting for him by his locker, full of smiles and happiness. He flinched as Kylo snatched his bag out of his locker and shoved what he needed into it. He slammed the door and ground his teeth together at the sound. He pulled on his jacket, grabbed his keys and then nodded at him that he was done with today.

It was only when they were parking in his spot in the driveway that he finally put his head down and screamed. Sitting with Hux for the entire period had lifted a burning frustration and reminded him that Hux didn’t want to be his friend anymore. He wasn’t supposed to do that. He was a liar and a betrayer.

“Look, Ky, I’m going to touch you now,” Poe said softly from the passenger seat. He’d almost forgotten he was there. “Let me know if that’s okay?”

“Yeah,” he managed to say. “Please.”

The last part came out pleading. But he did feel better when a warm arm came around his side to pull him into a hug.

“Tell me what happened.”

The words were so simple, but the answer escaped him. He just leaned into Poe’s neck. He felt a light kiss to his forehead and then he grunted, kicking at nothing.

“Hey, so, you’re upset. Can we go inside and talk and not scuff up your car?”

Poe was right, like so many times before. This was all despite how wrong Kylo’s reaction was to being presented with a challenge.

 

-=-

 

Rey had thought that today would be normal, but nothing about it had been. Even in the couple of weeks since the concert, she’d noticed more and more wrong things around her. She’d only made it through the performance because Kylo was watching her from beside the stage.

She’d gone to school and Rose and Finn had an argument. Kylo had been humming to himself before they parted before school. He was sitting at the breakfast table, writing in the blue journal, not the red one. He smiled at parts of his scribbling before he closed the book and told her to have a good day. She didn’t understand where his good mood came from.

Then came the annoying talk at school. And her teacher got mad at her because she didn’t want to sit at another table because that spot was hers. Her underwear was itchy and she could only sit in one spot because of it.

She had been grumpy when she got into Han’s car. She had spilled her thoughts to him in rapid and unending sentences. She was tired of her friends and she was tired of her teachers. She said that with shaking words to Han and then shut her mouth to frown out the window. She was just confused about Kylo. He’d be listening to her with kind eyes and soft touches, seeming like he never wanted to be away from her. She liked having Poe around but it wasn’t fair that Kylo could kiss people and she couldn’t. Her teacher and principal had to have a stupid meeting that day at the school with her when she had just kissed a couple of boys. They weren’t even cute boys; they were just boys and she wanted to know why Kylo thought it was so special.

Maybe it was just Poe who was special because she didn’t feel anything with those boys.

“It sounds like a rough day, sweetheart,” Han said, tapping on the steering wheel. “But it’s Friday. It’s the weekend. You’re going to have some time to think about all of this and put it in order. Maybe we can fill out the chart again.”

The chart. _The chart_. In her grumpy mood, she bit her lip as she thought about the stupid chart. Happy, less happy, sad, more sad, and neutral. She hadn’t done that since she was five. There were too many things that were under neutral and she was so angry at that moment; it might feel good to fill up some of the other squares. Teachers were stupid and she should stop trying to impress them. Boys were stupid because they didn’t know how to kiss.

“I don’t think I need the chart,” she mumbled, clutching her pink backpack. “I just need to talk to Kylo.”

She liked the pictures on her bag. They were bright and happy figures holding hands. It felt silly that she still had the same backpack as last year but she didn’t want to be wasteful. Finn was the same. He loved one jacket, even though he had holes in one elbow.

“Did he have practice today?” Han asked.

Rey rolled her eyes. “The season is over, dad.”

He glanced over, parked at the stop sign down the block from their house. “That’s right. I forgot.”

“You didn’t forget,” she answered. “You were making sure I was thinking.”

Grinning, Han leaned back and winked at her. “But it wasn’t a test. Just checking on how you’re feeling.”

She wanted to talk more, but settled for putting her head against the window.

Even though the ride had calmed her down, she wanted to throw her backpack when she got inside. She had stomped up the back porch and was mildly satisfied with every small _thunk_ against the wood. She thought it would feel good just to toss something and let it sit there, to not care about whoever had to pick it. Still, she hung it on the hook, narrowing her eyes at the fabric. There were spots of dirt and pen marks on one corner. Nothing ever stayed clean; she knew that she didn’t make it ruined, but it was still there. She huffed, flopping down to pull off her shoes.

“I think our girl needs a snack before dinner,” Han was behind her, calling to Leia in the kitchen. Rey had already heard the sounds of feet in the kitchen as she climbed the stairs. “Where are the boys?”

“In his room,” Leia let out a sigh that told her that Kylo was having a bad day too. But Leia quickly shook her head and her face changed into a smile when she looked at Rey. “Let’s get you something to eat so I can hear about your bad day. Then I’ll try to give you the barebones details I got out of them.”

Rey quirked her lips before nicking her head. She felt mildly selfish revisiting her own thoughts as she tried to read Leia’s look from earlier. It was almost easier to hold back whenever Kylo was angry or worried about something. But she had too; Maz reminded her to take more space and get her feelings out. She ate crackers and cheese, telling mom and dad about how everything had frustrated her and how she was always being told what to do, even when the things that she was doing weren’t really wrong. When it got to the point about trying to kiss the boys, she saw the familiar uncomfortable look between Han and Leia.

“Did they want you to kiss them, Rey?” Leia asked, leaning closer. That usually meant she did something wrong and they were afraid to tell her.

“Yes, but then they lied and said they didn’t. I just wanted to try it. I don’t want them to be my boyfriend.” She tried to shake off her frustration and not sound whiny. “I promise I won’t do it again.”

They still sat down and explained why the boys probably lied. It sounded believable; maybe they were afraid that they were too young for kissing. Rey couldn’t explain why she’d wanted to do it. But if Kylo could keep secrets from her, she wasn’t going to tell him. Leia and Han held her hand and asked her about other feelings that she was having. She bit her lip, telling them how her underwear were more itchy again. Leia nodded, and said they’d try another type _again_. Han asked her about her most recent nightmares and Rey had shrugged. They were about Snoke breaking her arm, how it burnt and stung; they were about being trapped in a closet, remembering how Kylo taught her not to cry; they were about holding Anja’s hand when she was hurting. She didn’t get why they were asking about the nightmares.

“We’ll have a meeting at the school on Monday with them, okay? I’m mad that they didn’t call us,” Leia frowned, leaving the last part for Han. “But Rey, you need to tell us when you have these feelings too, okay? Not just Kylo.”

“I think I get it. Kissing is for when you’re older, with real friends. Right?” She asked, trying to nod away mom and dad’s worried faces. “Just don’t tell Kylo. He’ll get upset. I’ll tell him, okay?”

She finished her snack and heard mom and dad talking about cancelling their plans for the night. She also heard dad call her school, leaving the house to talk outside, but Leia assured her that it wasn’t her that he was mad at. But there was some office party that they couldn’t avoid or cancel. Now that both Rey and Kylo were having bad days, maybe they should stay home.

“But I’m okay now,” she interrupted. She had been looking forward to not having the adults around for an evening. It would make up for the awful day she’d been having. They were going to watch movies and play normal games, not video games. Kylo had promised.

Han folded his arms. “We have a couple of hours to think about it. Go see what those boys are doing.”

They weren’t doing anything. They were sitting on the floor near Kylo’s bed, playing another dumb game about people in the woods. Kylo turned when he heard her and tried to give her a small smile, but she still saw that he was worried about something. She quickly sat next to him, pulling his arm around her shoulder for a hug.

“Kylo has to work with Hux on a project,” Poe said, setting his controller down. “I told him it’s not a big deal, the world isn’t ending. They don’t have to see each other outside of school or anything.”

“I still don’t want to work with him,” Kylo shot back. “He hates me.”

“Maybe,” Rey started, “maybe he’ll not hate you anymore if you do a good job?”

Poe smirked. “I already told him that.”

Rey grinned at him, but her smile faltered. “Mom and dad are worried to leave us alone.”

Kylo’s head fell back against the bed. “I already told them it was fine.”

“I had a bad day too so they’re…” she shrugged, “…worried, I guess.”

Kylo flopped his head towards her, eyes instantly switched off his problem to hers. _What happened, angel?_

 _Just silly things that I got mad about. But I’ve thought about it enough now. I’ll be fine in the morning._ She answered. She’d tell him more later, and he’d let her cry about it. But right now, they had to pretend that they weren’t upset anymore.

Rey shrugged out of Kylo’s arms to get her drawing book from his desk. She climbed onto the bed and started to turn her thoughts into forms to help her figure out how everyone must have felt instead of just looking at her own reactions. No one really understood her pictures except for Kylo. Maybe Agent Jinn; probably Agent Jinn too. He knew what the colours meant and what the shapes meant. He never wanted her to be sad, but still talked with her about it. He’d talk more when Poe wasn’t there, with kinder words and looks.

“Kids?” Han knocked on the doorframe, pulling them all out of their activities. “Everyone okay to be alone for the night.”

Kylo didn’t say anything. He just stared at the television.

“Yeah, Mr Solo, we’re good,” Poe said. “I’ve figured out how to open the lock on the liquor cabinet.”

Han sighed, folding his arms. It was a joke back at him and he didn’t like those. Rey had tried them. “Yeah, but just stay out of the good stuff. Kylo, can I talk to you alone for a minute.”

Kylo and his friend exchanged wide-eyed looks before he slowly stood up to talk to his father in the hallway. His shoulders were stiff and Rey hoped that they were because dad told him to do something and not because of anything else.

“What’s up?” Poe asked, biting his lip and turning to her.

“I don’t know,” Rey tried to shrug as she spoke. “But it’s probably something I said.”

“What’d you say? What happened at school today?” Poe’s voice was always kind and careful. He didn’t look sad right then. Maybe she could tell him. It was always hard to tell another sad person about how she was feeling. They never understood. Right now, he just looked worried. She could trust him. He was Kylo’s and they shared everything, like her and Kylo did.

“I kissed some stupid boys. It wasn’t special. It feels dumb now,” she slowly said. “But don’t tell Kylo I told you first.”

Poe stared at her, not speaking. “I don’t think that it’s that bad. Everybody played kissing games when I was your age and I kissed so many girls. If we were in the same class, I’d probably have kissed you too. But I think dad’s probably worried that it’s more about what happened there. Ky’s going to be worried too.”

Rey quickly shook her head. “But it’s not. Nobody kissed me when we were there. Snoke just bites people. I keep having a dream about him eating me. It’s like I can feel it. I wake up all itchy.”

“Hey, come here,” Poe said, pulling her into a hug. “Don’t you tell Ky about your nightmares?”

She nodded. “But I’ve been lying. And I don’t want to tell him about the boys. I don’t like lying, but he’s been happy now and I…”

She felt a light kiss placed on the top of her head. But it only came after a long inhale. “Rey, you don’t make him unhappy telling him your thoughts and that bad stuff. You’re so special to him that even if he’s in a bad mood he’ll always listen to you. But you’re allowed to be confused too, you know? Don’t they tell you that in therapy?”

“Yeah, Maz does,” she answered, cuddling closer. “I like your hugs.”

“Hey, I like your hugs too.” He pulled her closer. “You can always talk to me about this stuff too, right? I’m here to help you too, since I’m with Ky.”

She nodded, closing her eyes. A warm feeling spread across her chest. “I like talking to you too.”

The door opened and Kylo’s arms were folded but his face wasn’t red. His eyes darted around the room before settling on her before he smiled lightly. But he glanced back and gave Han a slight nod from the foot of the bed. He sat beside Rey and she moved to shift into his arms, worried what dad had told him.

He quickly looked down. _He just said to take care of you tonight. That you were upset from school and were frustrated about other kids too. Guess we keep having the same problems._

She nodded, believing him because Han would never say anything that she wanted to be private. Maybe Kylo just needed a reminder.

Han looked at Rey with raised eyebrows and she gave him a small smile and a nod. Han still looked reluctant to leave, but he’d already changed into fancy party clothes. Rey liked getting dressed up, but was starting to like it less with how Kylo acted when something he really liked to wear didn’t fit anymore. She felt the same, but knew that she’d find something else to make her favourite. Mom and dad would always get her new clothes.

“Okay, well, there’s money for pizza on the counter. Rey, don’t drink that much soda tonight. Boys, remember to clean up your messes and walk the dog. Good bedtimes, all right?” Han said, opening his arms to her. She hopped off the bed and hugged him. “Love you, baby girl. Make sure the boys take care of you.”

“I will,” she said, pulling back. “Bye dad. I love you.”

And they were alone. The house stilled around her and she shifted her weight, still standing in the doorway.

Poe turned off the television because Kylo was just staring at it, not moving.

“So, how can I cheer you both up? It’s shitty that everyone had bad days, so let’s do something about it. Ky, show Rey that picture I drew. The one you hated,” Poe was already standing. It was almost like Rey had always known him. He was more open than Hux, even when it came to being upset and mad about something.

Kylo put his head in his hands. “I need those notes. Why did you do that.”

“I like to make you mad,” Poe said and then grinned. “Come on, Rey. Get his bag.”

“Don’t _touch_ my bag.”

Poe ignored him and lunged over the bed to grab Kylo’s satchel. Rey was frozen in the movements, not understanding why Poe didn’t listen to Kylo while at the same time wanting to tease him too. She never wanted him to feel bad, but he wasn’t actually angry. He was just acting like he was. She quickly grabbed the bag too and Kylo looked at them with mock hate in his eyes. She could still feel the love there and let herself go with the joke.

“It’s in this one, yeah,” Poe said, handing the notebook to her while he half hung on the bed. Rey let her eyes grow wide at how many notebooks Kylo had in his bag. He didn’t want to let go of any idea, but it must have been heavy. “Look at it. It’s genius.”

Poe opened the notebook to the right page. Everything was carefully dated, with topics and subjects donning the top of every page. Neat lines and coloured highlights for different things that Rey didn’t understand. Some things were underlined.

“Hux is a pig man.” Rey read, looking at the silly sketch in the corner of Kylo’s carefully detailed physics notes. Poe had drawn the figure in pen in the corner of a man that looked vaguely like a pig if she squinted. “What’s a pig man?”

Kylo groaned. “He’s making fun of me. Don’t listen to him. It’s about what I finished reading in English. Now I have some dumb Shakespeare shit.”

Poe raised his eyebrows at her. “It’s Othello. Do you know Othello?”

“No, I’ve never met him,” Rey answered, confused.

But Poe didn’t laugh at her. She’d said a stupid thing but he still kept his face positive. “You’ll know him one day. In like ten years. I think he’ll be the same when you get to him.”

He held her eyes and she nodded, trying to put herself in the higher classes that they were taking. Would they be harder for her? Kylo would be grown up, but he’d still help her so she could grow up too.

Breaking out of the prison of the future, she giggled again, mostly. “I know what game we should play. It’s really fun. Can we play it?”

Poe didn’t even look at Kylo. “Yeah, let’s do it. Whatever makes Kylo forget about the pig man and you forget about the kids at school.”

She held Poe’s hand as they walked down the stairs, Kylo behind them by a few paces. She was quietly feeding off of Poe’s energy with the teasing. Kylo _looked_ miserable but he wasn’t really. There was a hidden smile in his eyes when they sat on the sofa and Rey started explaining the game, taking out the box from below the coffee table. They had a bunch of games, but this one was becoming her favourite. Having two boys look at her and listen to her made her almost forget what an awful day it had been. She saw, out of the corner of her eye, how Poe put his hand close to Kylo’s leg. The second he moved his hand closer, Kylo’s shoulders relaxed. She tilted her head and smiled.

The game went exactly like she thought it would. Kylo was a bad guesser.

She laughed more than she thought she would at how Poe acted. They made a team against Kylo, determined to bug him into caring about the game. He hated losing so when he finally realized that he was, it was almost too late.

He took a card and frowned. “I can’t do this. This card makes no sense.”

He was slouched down on the couch, frowning at the piece of red cardboard in his hand.

“Come on, do it Ky. I believe in you.” Poe was smiling, gripping at her shoulder.

“You’ve thought wrong,” he answered and slowly stood. “You’re just going to laugh at me.”

“That’s what’s fun!” Rey grinned, pushed by the hand on her back. “Be silly, Kylo. That’s why you’re losing.”

He steadied his eyes at her. “I’m only losing because it’s two against one.”

She felt her smile touch her eyes and he finally set his head back and started acting out the card. She tilted her head, watching his arms and body move in more and more concentrated patterns. She frowned when he glared at them for not getting it.

“Oh, oh! A clock! Is it a clock?” Poe suddenly said.

“Yes! It was a fucking clock!” Kylo looked at them like they were the stupidest people on earth. But Poe still leapt up and hugged him until she heard a long sigh from Kylo as they embraced. Her smile only brightened as they parted, both looking red-faced and avoiding each other’s eyes.

Kylo’s hand brushed Poe’s as they sat back down on the couch.

“So, we won, right Rey?” Poe asked, instantly turning to her.

“We beat him,” she answered, forgetting how bad the day had been before then, when all the words and feelings were blocked in her chest. “Can we get dinner now?”

She hugged Poe’s legs rather than Kylo’s when they went to the kitchen to decide what they wanted to eat. Pizza was good. She liked pizza. But now she wanted to try something else.

“Kylo, what haven’t I eaten before?” She asked, holding Poe’s hand as they danced to no music in the kitchen.

She wavered in slow dips and turns, the ones that were her favourite in class. He let her spin with his hand, easily figuring out how she wanted to turn.

She looked to Kylo when she heard music start to play from nowhere. He set his phone down on the counter and smiled at her. She saw how big Poe’s eyes got as he looked over at Kylo, but he still took her hands and danced with her in her second-favourite room of the house. Lumpy whined at their dancing; he stuck his nose in between them and pushed Poe away. She laughed and danced with the dog as the boys moved closer to one another. The song didn’t matter. Rey just liked being silly for once. She felt like she had to act a certain way at school; she had to tell her friends how to act and couldn’t show them too much silliness.

“Dance with me!” She shouted, reaching for Kylo’s hands.

Kylo could make jokes, but he was too serious. He had never really danced with her like this before. They’d never had a reason to. But now, he took her hands and swept her up into his arms. She wrapped her arms around his neck and she let her imagination take them to her empty space: the one where it was just her and him. How he acted most days, this wasn’t him. His happiness was more just an opposite sadness. It made her want to be like him, but also to teach him more of the softer side of the world that she could see. But he was getting there, and it helped her remember it too.

Caught up into his space, Rey let her happiness blossom in her chest. He was so close and wasn’t mad. He would sometimes be mad when things turned silly or dumb. She hugged him and kissed his neck. It was so good that mom and dad left.

She wasn’t sad anymore.

 

-=-

 

They ordered sushi. There was still a long list of things that Rey hadn’t tried.

Kylo didn’t want to leave them alone to pick it up, but it was the only way to do it. He hated the idea of a stranger bringing their food to his house. He didn’t want anyone to know where he lived that didn’t have to know it. Memories of the annoying and intrusive journalist flashed in his mind and kept him steady.

He also needed to steal a few minutes alone.

He sent Poe out with Rey to walk the dog. She was already telling him about Lumpy’s favourite bushes when they parted in the alley.

He didn’t play board games, especially charades. But he would for Rey. He didn’t dance to bad pop music in the kitchen. But he would for Rey.

The problem he was having now was that he’d never done it before without having Poe’s eyes there to push him out. Rey had easily accepted that he didn’t want to play the game with his parents. He told her that he’d rather watch her, and that was true. His father had danced with Rey in the kitchen on New Year’s Eve and his own stubborn unwillingness to embarrass himself, to act childish, kept him from doing the same.

He’d been drawn into her harder, because he wanted to make them both happy. He wanted Rey to forget her bad day. The words from his father didn’t make him nervous at first. But over the course of the evening, it was clearer that Rey was working harder to keep up with them and smile more. But he had liked taking care of her and making her feel special. It helped him keep crushing his bad day into dust.

And he also didn’t want Poe to leave.

Being alone meant he could sort through the two boxes in his head. Poe’s touches had been light that evening, with all of his attention on Rey. They were both there as a team.

He was desperately trying to make up for what happened last time that they were alone in the house. He wanted to let his body go loose and felt grounded by having Rey there. The touches were just as careful as they needed to be; he’d taught Poe how to ask him with his eyes over the last few weeks. They had found hidden moments to be alone at school and exchanged embraces on his bed on the few evenings that they’d been able to steal between homework and bedtimes and goodbyes that were growing more and more painful.

But it was a good hurt. He never thought that he’d think that way, but the last two months had taught him that. There was always the promise of school the next day, or text messages late at night. He wasn’t doing anything to push Poe away, but was also not able to do anything to get them closer.

Tonight was surfacing from under a frozen pond.

He wanted to leave his fear in the cold water, to scramble out onto the ice.

But he knew that it would still crack and he’d still fall back into it.

 

-=-

 

Rey woke up when mom lifted her up. She hadn’t realized that she’d fallen asleep. Flashes of her eyes drifting shut rattled to her memory as she slowly realized where she was. The images were from the last movie: she had managed to stay awake that long. They’d watched movies after dinner. Sushi in front of the television had turned into more laughing and teasing. Kylo had tried to give her all of his shrimp, but Poe had made him eat one. He looked disgusted and said that he hated them both; she just laughed along with Poe at the same look. She still saw Poe steal from Kylo, taking the pieces that he liked more.

They watched three movies. Kylo let her take his pick; he had made her do it because he felt the same way about deciding anything at that point. Or maybe he trusted her more to pick something. She was nervous picking a movie for boys, especially how they were. She left to go to the bathroom and made sure she opened the door upstairs loudly to make sure that she wouldn’t make them feel nervous around her. She was in between them on the couch and decided to pick a fantasy movie. Something about dragons. When it got too scary, both boys hugged her and told her that she was safe. She already knew that it wasn’t real, but she hated seeing kids hurting. Both Poe and Kylo wanted to turn it off but she shook her head. If she could just shut her eyes, she could remember good and real things. They weren’t getting hurt for real.

The next movie was something about sports and she was more confused than anything. Dad watched sports. Kylo would come downstairs and say something about a baseball or hockey game like he knew what was going on. Han had sat with her and tried to explain a hockey game to her a few times. It still seemed silly. Everyone should win. Everyone should be happy. Losing was something that Kylo hated and she started to understand why; losing meant hurting other people who cared about you.

Parts were in Spanish and she looked at Poe with big eyes as he smiled at the screen. He was telling things to them both. Rey didn’t want to take Spanish. She wanted to take French, like Leia. When she had started real school, they had a big meeting. It was like having her future laid out for her in sheets of paper and lists with expectations. Leia took French so she wanted to do that too to make sure mom still loved her when she got bigger. But watching Poe teach Kylo how to pronounce words made her want to still take French. They needed to have this part. She’d teach Kylo French like Poe was doing when she was older and knew it perfectly.

She was too tired to make her final choice. And they ended up watching something really, really boring. Kylo had looked it up and it was supposed to be good but they were falling asleep within the first half an hour. People were just talking and not doing anything, and then there was running and more nothing. She put her head in Kylo’s lap and stretched her feet out on Poe’s. He rubbed her ankles and she looked up at him with a small smile before lying back down again.

It was late and she was awake after midnight, still forcing herself to watch boring people in brown coats pretend that they were in a movie.

She could do big kid things too.

Still, mom and dad were home. And she was back to being small.

Yawning, she hugged Leia and looked down at the boys. They were stirring awake, pretending that they hadn’t fallen asleep as well. Kylo tried to fix his messy hair before giving up and staring off into nothing.

“They should have known better,” Leia mumbled. “What were you watching?”

She shook her head. “It wasn’t scary. It was really boring.” She leaned in to whisper to Leia. “It was about the FBI.”

Leia still watched the two dark-haired heads on her couch with a frown. She was wearing her glasses and smelled like a party. Rey took a deep breath to inhale the smell. Han came into the room and she saw a dark blotch on his shirt. They were also too tired. Rey felt herself creeping closer to Leia and hated that tears were coming to her eyes. She hated being tired. She’d done a good job. She’d been so good the entire night. She wanted to argue more, but it would only come out in sobs.

She just wanted mom right then. She hugged her closer and gripped at her hair. They must have been tired if Leia’s hair was down and long.

She hated her own whimpering when she heard it.

“Boys,” Leia raised her voice, looking down at the two half-asleep teenagers on the sofa. “Go sleep downstairs for once. You’re worn her out. Ben, we don’t tell you what to do because you know better. Can you look at me for a second?”

Kylo lifted his head and blinked at her. “We know better. But it was fun. It really was fun, mom.”

Leia sighed and hugged Rey closer. “What did you eat tonight?”

“We got sushi. And we cleaned up everything,” Poe said. “Rey really liked it, right Rey?”

She nodded and then whispered into mom’s neck, to make it feel like a secret. “I really liked it. It was really good. We took Lumpy for a walk and Kylo went and got it. I didn’t have any bad thoughts.”

“Okay, everyone,” Han finally said, striding into the room. “It’s two a.m. Ben, Rey had a bad day. Give her some space. There’s a couch and a bed in the basement. No playing video games all night. Go and sleep and don’t stare at screens all night, boys.”

Kylo sat up and was about to argue but she watched the fight die in his eyes and drop his head.

“We’re okay, we can do that,” Kylo answered. “I’m sorry, dad. It was nice tonight. Rey just wanted to be like us and we…we messed up. _I_ messed up. She wanted to spend time with us and I…”

She was being carried upstairs as the conversation continued without her own voice. She was too tired. She was already falling asleep again. Rey wanted to object, but instead she just rested her head against Leia’s neck and let herself get taken away to bed.

Leia let her change herself, even though her hands were sleepy.

“Were the movies really okay, Rey?” She asked.

Rey nodded, feeling the softness of her pyjama top on her body. Her pants were better; she loved how the pants felt. When she slept, she didn’t have to wear panties. That part was the worst at school. She had told Kylo how much she hated it and he had spent days thinking about why she didn’t want to wear them. There were so many struggles that they shared and this part brought them both pain. Her underwear shouldn’t be such a big deal but he hated, with pure agony in his eyes, whenever they needed to buy new pairs. Other kids would have accidents at school. But mom and dad bought these things for her. She couldn’t ruin them. Kylo would blame himself when they talked about it, but it wasn’t his fault.

She settled into bed beside mom and dad. “I picked something kind of scary in the beginning, but Poe and Kylo helped me. It wasn’t really scary because it wasn’t real. Then we watched Poe’s movie and it was kind of boring. I think I messed it up. I didn’t know what to pick for the last one to Kylo told me.”

She yawned, breathing in dad’s cologne. He smelled like Kylo, but covered up. “He should have picked something that everyone would like. Hey, Rey, we’re not keeping you from him. But maybe he needs to rethink his choices right now. He gets upset when he’s away from you.”

“No, you’re not,” she mumbled, nestling in between them. “He’s got…he needs his friend. I’m still…I’m…”

She lost her words, drifting in and out of sleep.

“Go to sleep, okay, sweetheart?” Leia said, kissing her on the cheek.

She’d spend many nights when Kylo had been away with the parts that made him the real him. But she still wanted to argue and be more like him in that moment. But she was pulled down too heavily by sleep. She knew that he loved her more. No matter what happened.

 

-=-

 

Kylo’s face was still flushed when he slammed the door to the basement guestroom closed. He tried to stop from shaking but the room was too bright. He hit the light switch hard with his palm, sucking in the brief jab out of numbness.

“He wasn’t exactly being unfair,” Poe said switching on the lamp by the bed. He stretched, the hint of his midriff catching Kylo’s eye before he sat down. The bed squeaked, and Kylo turned away again. When he spoke, Kylo could hear the shrug in his voice. “I tried to take some of the blame too.”

“He didn’t understand. He never gets it.” He was still looking at the closed door, tracing the knob with one hand.

He finally turned and Poe was frowning at him. “You’re really exaggerating right now. We stayed up too late. You said that Rey wanted to stay up but we both saw her yawning. She’s still a little kid, no matter how tough she acts. Guess we didn’t want the night to end either. But he wasn’t really telling you what to do. And he was drunk and still didn’t punch you in the face so maybe calm down a little.”

Rage flared and then quickly snuffed itself out in his chest in one look from Poe. “He…he’d never do that to me.”

“Hey, come here.” Poe motioned with his hands and Kylo was drawn towards the bed. Poe took his hand, but the guilt remained. “That was…stupid of me to say. I was feeling sorry for myself. I know your dad isn’t like that. Totally unfair.”

Poe squeezed his hand, but his eyes were still looking at the door. He was thinking about leaving; Kylo had upset him by being like he was. He needed to say something to keep him there. He thought again about the conversation upstairs. He’d been tired, but also upset at himself that he let Rey get that exhausted. Han was right; he should have known better. But they were trying to undo what had happened at school. He hadn’t thought about Hux all night and knew that Rey hadn’t thought about her friends either.

“It wasn’t stupid, you were right.” He leaned over, placing a light kiss on Poe’s cheek, hoping he’d turn towards him. “I guess I’m tired. I know that my dad is nothing like yours and that’s not right.”

“I know that you see it, but they walk around on eggshells around you. They put up with me being here all the time because maybe I calm you down a bit, but I don’t know if I really do that. Like eating dinner with Jinn. Nothing could calm you down then. He means that much to you so I didn’t want to hold you back.” Poe’s eyes were still in the distance, not looking at him. “Ky, I like being here. I liked tonight, hanging out with you and Rey. I didn’t want us to get in trouble either but maybe it’s okay to get in trouble here. It was for Rey.”

Kylo sucked in a long breath. Poe saw right through him and his family, how they interacted. He kept wanting to hate his parents. He wanted to lash out at them for so long. In the beginning, it was the easiest way to sort out what had happened: they had left him, they had forgotten about him. They had left him to be cast into a life of agony and he had to get himself out, without help. But now, two years later, he’d only went through his bitterness when he needed it. It wasn’t always burning in the back of his mind.

Poe was letting him think, staying quiet. He turned to study him, tracing the line of his jaw. His hair had gotten longer, spilling around his ears. Kylo freed his hand to stroke down the other boy’s neck, feeling the length of the dark locks.

“Hey, stop it. I know I look stupid.” Poe leaned away from his hand. “Don’t remind me.”

“No, I like it.” Kylo countered, dropping his voice. “What did I do? What’s wrong?”

He finally turned to face him. His normally lively eyes were still, making him tense. “I’ve been thinking about what Rey told me all night. It’s why I was trying so hard. I couldn’t think about it anymore.”

His throat tightened. “What did she tell you?”

Confusion wrinkled the corners of Poe’s eyes. “Didn’t she tell you? With the blinking thing?”

He shook his head, reaching with his tense hand to grip Poe’s leg. “What are you talking about?”

Poe squeezed his eyes shut, frustration creasing his forehead. “Fuck. Fucking fuck. She didn’t tell you? She got in trouble at school because she was kissing other boys and I thought that it was because you told her and…”

His hand tightened. He tried to steady his breathing. Poe would think he was angry at him. “I didn’t tell her. This is why I didn’t want to say anything to her. I told you.”

Poe flopped down on the bed, still pulling away from him even as he scrambled to take his hand. He yanked it away and stood from the bed. He had rings under his eyes that Kylo rarely saw. It was after 2 a.m., closing in on 3 a.m. He squared his jaw and Kylo could see the tears forming in Poe’s eyes and he had to fight to stay in the large, plush guestroom bed. It was the biggest bed in the house. Kylo had intended a different conversation at that point. He wanted Poe’s comfort and not an argument. But if Rey was hurting and turning to Poe instead of him, then he had to push past what his body wanted. His hand went to press on his wrist, still keeping his eye on Poe.

“I’m not mad at you, okay? I’m just frustrated right now. Like, keeping this a secret from your parents? Yeah, I’m all for that. Your mom would tell mine and then I’d never see you again and I’d probably end up dead because my fucking dad isn’t giving me nice small talks. But you don’t lie to Rey and I just want to know what you’re really thinking if this is happening.” Poe took a deep breath and turned away. Kylo watched the rise and fall of his shoulders before he turned back. “Okay, I guess I am a little mad at you.”

“I…” he started and then bit his lip. He ran through several arguments in his head and none of them felt right every time that he looked into Poe’s eyes. He let his head drop and played with his wristband. The warm sensation of tears pricked at the edges of his eyes and he desperately tried to blink them away. “I don’t think that this is about us.”

He heard Poe take a breath and slowly step towards him again. “Tell me I’m wrong here, Ky. Please tell me that he never did to her what he did to you.”

He quickly shook his head. “But there was other stuff. Stuff that I was just hoping that she’d forget. I _know_ that she didn’t. It’s just started happening recently. It’s like it’s coming back to her in bits but in the wrong places. She hates wearing underwear. I let her…she made me think that she’d forgotten. I hate anything that I can’t fix for her and I can’t think straight if I’m in my own head too much. That’s why I need you. I need you to let me say these things. She knows what happened but doesn’t understand it and I can’t fix it for her without you.”

Looking up, he met a pair of eyes that mirrored his sadness. “I mean that much to you?”

He swallowed. He wanted to tell him how much he missed him when he wasn’t there. He wanted to tell him how he felt lifted every morning when they met at school. He longed to tell him how he wanted to make up for what happened the last time they were alone. Instead, his mouth just croaked out, “Yeah.”

Poe reached out for his hands and he took them, standing into an embrace. He curled around him, pulling him closer. He’d caused all this: his anger, his pain, his inability to figure out what he wanted. Poe kept thinking he was confused and didn’t want this sort of friendship. He kept telling him that they could back off. But he needed this.

He settled his hands on Poe’s hips as he gently pulled away. “I can’t put this on Rey right now. I hate lying to her, but I’ll just…go away, in my head, if she’s hurting and I can’t fix it.”

“Ky,” Poe started then reached up, touching his face after pausing to ask him if he could keep touching him; of course he could at this point. He finally started talking again once his hand cupped his face. “You need to tell your parents about what happened. They need to know how to talk to her about what she doesn’t understand right now. Not just what they hear from the shrinks.”

He watched a lazy curl drift from the top of Poe’s head down to his forehead. He was right. Still, he clenched his jaw. “So I’m wrong again.”

“Not wrong, no way.” Poe shook his head. “You just need more help. And not just mine.”

He dropped his forehead against Poe’s, wanting to be closer to him but denying himself because of how torn he felt about everything. It meant admitting his weaknesses. And he had to. “I’m not good at that.”

The silence held them for a few breaths and Kylo shut his eyes, taking it in. Finally, Poe sighed. “Yeah, I know.”

He took in the energy from the quiet and poured it into the kiss he pressed on the shorter boy’s lips. He heard Poe inhale as he leaned into him. And then the feeling changed in an instant.

“Ky, you’re not okay,” Poe said, pushing back, yet still resting his hands on his shoulders. He drew on the warmth and let it melt the ice further. “Let’s just go to sleep. Your parents are upstairs, with Rey and…”

The pressure from earlier returned. Playing the stupid game: slipping up and hugging him. Watching him dance with Rey: dancing with her too. That part was for her: this was theirs. He kissed him again, feeling light resistance at first and then finally acceptance. Once he had him on the same level, he pulled him down against the large mattress. This was the biggest bed in the house. It had always been. Even when he was small, this was supposed to be Luke’s room but he was always running from something that Kylo still didn’t understand. He’d missed seven years of other people’s lives too.

He gasped at the thought, pulling the other boy closer, more harshly than he intended.

“Ky, stop,” Poe managed yank himself away, looking at him seriously for a moment before letting it fade into gentle eyes. He stroked his cheek, looking down at him with an expression that made Kylo even more frustrated because it wasn’t clear what he wanted. “You’re looking at me weird.”

“This started off as an awful day, but now I’m…I’m worried about everything. I’m in two again. I don’t know where to focus. I’m upstairs with Rey but I’m also here…” he trailed off and shook his head, trying to get his thoughts out but they were too twisted. “And then I was just thinking about how this bed is too big. And that we’re alone.”

Poe pursed his lips, his eyes darting away as he shifted slightly closer. It was still okay. He had to believe that. “I like being alone with you. We both just need to know that we’re feeling the same thing and mean it. I hate saying that you’re bad at anything, but you kind of forget other people when you’re in your own head. I’m glad that you said it just now.”

“I know,” he answered, quickly. He brought up his own hand, letting his thumb dip into Poe’s mouth. He felt him tense at the intrusion, but slowly accept it. “Empathy. Maz says it all the time.”

He moved his hand, settling to lay himself down next to Poe. He finally shifted away, dropping his head. He needed to back off. He was just coming together and now he was getting drawn into the physical part of darkness. He pulled away more, seeing the way his hand slipped so easily into Poe’s mouth when he couldn’t do it himself, let him touch him that way. Panic was only a breath away when he finally cast himself outside of his own body.

“Your parents call you Ben still.” Poe’s voice was soft, distant from the other side of the bed. “Does it make you mad?”

He breathed in and out, feeling every movement of his lungs. He wanted him to touch him again but also didn’t want it. He was starting to hate himself again for all of this, especially what Poe had just mentioned. “To them, that’s who I am. They don’t want to believe that I died and came back like this. All fucked up.”

“I can be there, you know? To talk to your parents about this.” Poe leaned forward, slowly lifting his hand. Kylo gave an exhausted nod and then felt the release of the palm against his cheek. He closed his eyes, leaning into the warmth. “Hey, I get free meals out of this.”

He blinked and then saw Poe’s grin. He managed one of his own, but still fought back for his serious tone. “Don’t joke.”

“The last part, yeah, but the first part…” Poe shifted closer, letting his face fall again, matching how Kylo felt. “This sadness won’t get better unless you spread it out. That’s what we are doing when we are us, but for Rey, maybe spread it a little more. We’re all just kids and I’m smart enough to know that adults don’t have all of the answers, but they know how to get them.”

“How can you still trust them?” Kylo narrowed his eyes. “Trust that there is anything out there but misery?”

Poe shifted his hand to his shoulder, rubbing small circles until Kylo sighed. “It takes a while to find the right people. Maybe my, whatever, misery was built on people, but I guess I’ve known more of them than you. And most of them have mistreated me, but I’ve still known some good people, or at least people who could be less shitty to me. That’s really god awful when you think about it, but I’m always talking or fighting my way out of things. Don’t feel bad that you’re not as good as I am when it comes to figuring out who to trust. You’re parents, yeah I can trust them. They’re figuring it out.”

Kylo almost smirked at the long statement that he’d just had to listen to. “You’re nervous.”

“Course I am. You looked like you wanted to eat me before.” Poe’s voice was soft, but still reminded him that there were consequences to his moods. “Ky, you’re tired. I’m tired. Let’s just go to bed.”

Kylo moved forward, pulling the other boy into an embrace. He just wanted the conversation to be over. “Yes.”

Poe settled into his arms, finally. He felt sleep start to tug at him as he was lulled into the warmth of the body next to him. He nestled closer, sighing. Feeling Poe tighten his arms, he breathed him in. The room was too clean. The sheets were too firm. Flashes of a distant hospital room sparked in his mind, back to when he thought he was strong but was ultimately weak. Now, he was a mixture of the two, losing himself in two places: upstairs and downstairs.

A light kiss on his forehead. “Don’t sleep in jeans. Come on.”

He shifted slightly, moving only to meet Poe’s eyes. He searched them, looking for something to say that would make him stay so he wouldn’t be alone. “You let me be me too.”

He said the right words.

And got the right response.

Poe smiled and took his hand. He smirked at it and kissed his palm. “Tonight was…for you and Rey. It was only a little for me. I can’t think of better perfection for her, seeing you let go a little. If we can help her, then maybe we can figure ourselves out, right?”

He was almost glad for the lack of full light because he cheeks burned with the implications of hurting Rey more, but it was a pain that would take time to heal. When he was making his grand plans back when his face first hit sunlight, holding her tightly and leaving a husk of a corpse behind them, this was never a part of all of it. He was supposed to be dead and stay dead and not haunt them every step of the way. Emotions were meant to be stuffed in barrels and left to rot, like the bodies of the children that he’d help kill. Now, he was being forced to deal with lids not fitting and clasps breaking. Rey. Rey. Rey. She would have to know the truth one day, beyond what he’d already told her. But this world that he was building now meant new lies and truths. He could share Poe with her for silly moments and other more childish times, but he couldn’t share him like this with her. This was only for him. And he hated himself for that. Even as he ran his hand through Poe’s hair and sighed at how it curled, he rode on two different levels. Rey’s hair was straight and light. Poe’s was curly and thick.

He could have two people. But he was hurting them both with his in decision.

“Were you really okay tonight?” He asked, still letting his hands thread through Poe’s hair, feeling warmth grow in his groin at the feeling. Rey was soft and innocent, the corruption only dawning in pinpricks that would break the dam. Poe wasn’t the opposite; he saw how quickly his moods could shift and was the only one who knew what had happened to him still. Yet, he stuck with him, wanted to be around him in this friendship. Enough conflicting emotions remained within Kylo to make him realize that he needed to stop splitting the world into black and white. Poe was grey, no matter what he tried to spout off when Kylo cornered him in what he was avoiding saying. He kept touching him, wanting to find out which way he could turn.

“Shit, I should ask if you’re okay again, but this feels too good,” Poe said and tilted his head. He wanted him to lean in more, and it was all he cared about in that second. Getting Poe to respond felt like his only goal. “Hey, Ky, I’m going to kiss you now. Is that okay? I won’t touch you.”

“I’m okay, really okay,” he breathed out his reply, forcing his demons down to see the white over the black and grey, before their lips met again. It was a tender and deep kiss, letting him know that he’d done what he had to do to get what he wanted. He still let his tiredness feed into how reckless he wanted to be, the pressure from before returning to his chest and spreading down to his dick. He was so done with the circling that they’d done the last month. Poe had almost given him space: not too much, but enough to make him nervous about what had happened earlier, when he’d forced intimacy upon them that he wasn’t ready for. It was his fault for pushing him. He had to let his body go, to let Poe feel in control. He had to give up his grip on it all. He didn’t want to be sick or hate himself: those were the only goals he had for the night. To feel release was there too, dominating how he wanted to feel. He wanted to let Poe do to him what he wanted him to do.

The kisses deepened and he groaned, reaching for Poe’s shirt.

“Ky, I need to back off. You’re getting spacy and…” Poe’s hands quickly pushed him away and he huffed, earning him a glare of warning as the other boy stood suddenly. He had moved off of the bed so quickly that Kylo didn’t realize that he was alone over the covers. Poe could only look at his harshly for so long before breaking and looking away. “Don’t do that to me. I want you too. Just get changed.”

He blinked, and then finally nodded. He turned and numbly took off his shirt. He watched it hit the wall, suddenly distant from them, and fall dully into the darkness. Destroying the calm was all he could do. Anger started to pierce his mood as he took off his belt and move on to his pants. With his jeans, he aimed for the idiotic painting that Leia had hung there years ago. The denim hit its mark; the stupid, tranquil scene fell with the sharp air of glass shattering and he eyed what he had done with aching satisfaction.

The bed creaked. Poe was still moving and that meant that he’d be talking soon too. He had distantly heard him take off his clothes as well, letting them fall onto the floor without as much noise as he wanted to make. “Come on. If you’re breaking things, you’re tired too.”

He turned and slipped under the covers, holding to his corner of the bed.

Slender, yet strong, arms slid to grasp his waist. He turned instantly, his stubbornness dying with a needed touch.

Poe was smiling at him as he shifted to meet his face. He was a master at grinning through pain so Kylo didn’t know what he should expect when he started to speak again. “You know what? You could destroy this whole room and your parents would just say ‘Well, I guess go clean it up’ and I’d be there helping you like a moron, taking half of the blame. Or most of the blame, since it’s probably my fault. Why are your parents so nice to me and to you? They let us get away with so much shit.”

“They’re really not that easy,” he paused, but then let himself react to the white teeth of his friend, finally letting a wryness take over his voice as he nestled himself closer to Poe, “but that is how it would go.” His lighter tone vanished as he worked through the rest of his thoughts. “This is why I told you not to like me. This is my entire life. I’m worried about Rey, I fight for control all of the time, I try to hate my parents but I…”

Poe interrupted him with a light kiss, pulling him closer still. “Don’t, Ky. I’m not going anywhere. Mostly because it’s 3 a.m. and…”

“Shut up,” he said, bringing their mouths together in a rough kiss that made them both gasp. He had shocked himself with how quickly he could switch from misery to desire. It would have confused him more if he didn’t want to kill what was inside of him; he needed his friend to end the indecisive emotions that still weighed on him. He gripped Poe’s back and then let his hands drift to Poe’s to guide them up his chest. If he helped the touches, they shouldn’t frighten him. If he was in control at first, this should be easier. He hated contradicting himself but this was how it had to be as long as every part of his body wanted him to start and stop and then start again. He could do this, even if it meant forcing himself to do it.

Poe’s hands were around his neck, his mouth still on his. It was just another day; the annoyance and pain from before was losing ground to today’s early hours. But time really meant nothing. There had been years in his life in which he only knew the when it was in the day by Snoke’s movements, up and down the stairs. Time only passed when the smell from the basement grew to be too much to breathe and Snoke finally forced him to move the rotting flesh to be under ground. Rey would say that they’re going to heaven only because he’d told her that. They didn’t go anywhere. They just went into the abyss. Tears rose in his chest and he turned them into motion by pulling Poe on top of him. He went willingly, straddling him and letting him know that he was just as turned on by his kisses and touches. The rush to his dick happened in that instant and he groaned, lunging up to kill the dead memories. He wanted to tell him that it was okay. He was sleepy, only because of his lingering headache from being angry before, but still awake and wanting this, whatever it turned into. The edge was already taken off. He could let himself come without shame tonight. He had to.

“Fuck, Ky,” Poe hissed, kissing up his cheek to his ear. That’s where he was the most sensitive. Snoke had never touched him there. This was a spot for love. This was a spot for care. He was lunging against him, hard too. Fuck, this was what he wanted too. He had to breathe. He has to feel himself be alive.

“Touch me,” Kylo forced out. “Please.”

He felt Poe’s heavy breaths against him as he leaned back, letting his hands trace along his chest before stopping. He started to feel lost without the touches when they stopped. Poe bit his lip before he started to speak in an almost whisper. “Not if you don’t really want this. Kylo, I want this so much but you’re still…think about me okay. Focus on that.”

He nodded, letting his head sag back. Poe’s hands moved tentatively down towards his stomach, caressing and not hurting. He could do this. His brain was telling him to feel the wrong things. His brain was guiding him towards panic and fear, flashes of hurt arcing through his mind. Snoke wasn’t there. He wasn’t seven. He was in control over what was happening to him now. He was home, safe. He’d put himself in this situation because he desired this. Desire, want, need; Snoke told him those feelings were wrong. But he was guiding his own path now. He’d started this on a warm day in California, even when he didn’t know where he was. Poe’s hands were there suddenly, helping guide him through his panicked stated.

“Help me let go.” His voice wasn’t his own, speaking like the dead boy that he had been and still might be. In that moment, he was still lost in the memory of breaking down a door and escaping into sunlight.

Poe’s lips were against his in an instant, shifting from kissing along his jaw back to his mouth. He was light and gentle, holding him closer than he should feel comfortable with. But he could feel how he wanted him too; his erection was brushing against his with every motion of his hips. He sighed at the sensation instead of letting tears take him. The sun on his face warmed him with each step. He felt the warmth in the air rather than the pain if being trapped.

“Tell me the second this feels wrong,” Poe whispered, leaning down against his ear. He nodded instantly, afraid of responding with words.

When he felt him moving down his body, he totally lost whatever he could have said. The hands and fingers were soft, caressing his stomach. There were no scratches, no demand. He could say no. He could stop it. Poe kissed his navel and he jolted upwards, hoping that it was the right response. He knew that his body felt want and panic as the same emotion.

And then he instantly lifted his hips when Poe’s hands hooked onto his boxers. He wanted this. They both did. He heard him inhale, then his soft breath brushed against his erection. He couldn’t look at him and what he was seeing. He was disgustingly hard.

Warm lips kissed the start of his pubic hair. He wanted to apologize, to say anything, when he jolted up again at the feeling of warm breath against his dick returned. He opened his eyes, daring himself to be afraid.

“Ky, I’m going to, um, hold you and then do this,” Poe whispered, meeting his eyes in the darkness. But in that same moment, he was bathed in the California light, on the dirt path to freedom. “Please, please tell me when to stop.”

“Just go,” he answered, setting his head back down and closing his eyes again. He was running, his weak legs holding what mattered most to his chest and trying not to weep at what he’d just done.

The moment was shattered and he knew where he was after a sharp intake of breath and a light grip around his dick. His eyes opened in that instance and he tried to be there in that moment. He knew it was a wanting and eager tongue that swirled suction around his dick. He knew it was a careful hand that was stroking in time with the beautiful mouth that the tongue belonged to. He fell into the fantasy that this was normal, that he wasn’t ruined as a person, that he wouldn’t always be running on gravel that cut his feet, forever in a place that wasn’t home. And he let it all fall into the growing pressure in his lower half. Heat traveled down his body and he could only see the ceiling of the guest room, even when he closed his eyes. Poe’s mouth was perfect because it was his: his lips, his teeth, his tongue. He still couldn’t touch himself but he was letting this happen. The slight pressure of teeth and tongue made him groan.

He couldn’t run from it now. He was going to come soon from Poe’s hand and mouth, moving in tandem. He wanted to come but didn’t know when and was suddenly nervous that Poe wouldn’t like how he tasted. There was a smell in the air that he knew was desire; he was almost familiar with it now, this intimacy. And he didn’t want to disappoint anyone. Especially Poe.

“Fuck,” he said in a gasp. “How can this be happening…?”

He let the question go out into nothing.

His heart was beating quicker with every motion that Poe made. He could feel how Poe was rocking his body in time with his hand, rolling his hips against the mattress. When he looked down, meeting his eyes, he could see how he filled his mouth. Poe broke the eye contact after pausing, withdrawing from him for a second to lick his lips and focus on whether or not Kylo wanted him to stop. Sharing the gaze made him realize that they couldn’t go back from this. Poe would still tell him all of the time that they didn’t need to do this. But to Kylo, he franticly couldn’t give up this part of their friendship. He would see how Poe’s face would transform when he saw him. He was giving him somewhere to go, somewhere that was a home.

He nodded to Poe and he took him in his mouth again, returning to bring him closer to release. He could handle this. His body needed it. The months of teasing, both the stolen and hidden embraces and kisses, had brought him to this point; but what mattered most was what they had said to one another. Poe would be talking right now if he wasn’t doing this for him. And he also knew that Rey needed help that Kylo couldn’t give alone. This was happening without words, lifting him physically to catch up to his head and heart.

He didn’t say anything before he came, letting his nerves explode in an instant when the suction and pace of Poe’s hand forced it to happen. He had felt it build, and the panic was still there; his heart thudded like a forgotten hammer, falling to a workshop floor in repeated succession. He fought to cling to the light that blossomed in his eyes rather than fall into his dread because he felt Poe’s mouth shift to start swallowing him; he should have said something. Poe was doing this for him, he should have warned him. He couldn’t let the shaking take over. His hands were clenched in the sheets, gripping the fabric harder as he came.

He knew what was happening and he felt Poe suck down his release. There were long clunks as he thrust up. Time in his mind slowed down, locking him in the moment. He’d hit a new peak, gasping and moaning as his body still lingered in the afterglow, but that only meant that there would be a harsh fall after.

He’d asked for this. He wanted this.

Poe sat up, searching his eyes for fear and anxiety. Kylo reached for him, but he turned away from the embrace, avoiding his mouth and offered kiss.

“Hey, um, you probably don’t want to do that. How are you feeling?” Poe was wiping his mouth, keeping his eyes away from his even as he brushed his hand with his free one. He took two deep breaths and then moved off of the bed, lingering in the doorway to make sure that he was okay. “I’m going to be right back.”

Poe left him alone and he shut his eyes, letting the guilt that he knew was coming roll over him. He was alone and could only hear himself breathing. His face felt warm when he thought about if he had made any sounds, but no one had heard him on that dirt road either when he cried out. He fixed his boxers, pulling them up and then arranging the covers.

Blinking in the darkness, emptiness started to take over. He stared at the closet, running his hand along the blanket.

Poe returned, quietly getting into the bed beside him. Kylo lifted his eyes and nodded, desperate to have arms around him, wanting to chase away the temptation of feeling nothing. It had been too much, but almost the right sort of too much. The lamp blinked on and then off again and Kylo reached for him, rolling him over to kiss him. His mouth tasted like the toothpaste in the downstairs washroom: too much mint. He clung to him, nestling his head against his neck, forcing himself not to cry.

“We shouldn’t have done that,” Poe said, roughly into his hair. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

“I wanted to,” Kylo managed to answer, his mouth feeling dumb. “I’m sorry.”

“For what? I should be sorry. Ky, you’re shaking.” Poe’s voice dropped. He couldn’t let him think that he did anything wrong. He didn’t. He was perfect.

He was the one who was wrong.

Kylo lifted his head, meeting the other boy’s eyes in the darkness. “I don’t want to go back.”

Poe closed his eyes, letting his head rest back. He slowly sat up, gently pushing Kylo to sit up as well. He switched on the lamp and brought his knees up to rest under his chin. He was pulling away, afraid. Kylo stared at his eyelashes, hoping that they stayed dry.

“Ky, what happened just now, I liked being in the moment, but dealing with this stuff afterwards…it wears me out. I need time too. Let me catch up. Today was great, but tomorrow will probably suck and I don’t want you to feel like this was something bad.” Poe slowly met his eyes and he saw the tears start to shimmer in the dull light coming from beside the bed. “Please still like me.”

Reaching out, he covered Poe’s knee with his hand. He shouldn’t feel this way, ever. “I still like you.”

Poe’s eyes settled on his hand and he nodded. He pulled Poe into his arms, trying to take away the heavy sadness and thick silence of the room. He heard Poe mumble into his neck as he finally accepted the embrace. “I lo-…I like you so much.”

“I can sleep on the couch,” Kylo said, pulling back after hearing his indecision. “If you want to be alone.”

Poe rolled his eyes and grinned, the tension broken as quickly as it had come. “That’s what I’m supposed to say.”

He leaned down and kissed him, taking in the moment of being not fully happy, but also not drawn into sorrow either. He’d take it for now.

 

-=-

 

Kylo woke up to the buzzing of something. He shut his eyes hard, willing a full headache to take hold, before he sat up. He shifted Poe out of his arms and reached for his jeans, trying to nab them from the edge of the bed.

He glared at his phone. 5.30.

 _Can you meet to talk about the project today? I need this grade_.

Fuck off, he was about to write. He was also about to send the phone flying into the wall but the flash of Rey’s disappointed eyes made him stop. Instead, he just tossed it weakly onto the floor.

Poe mumbled something as he gathered him into his arms again.

“What?” he whispered, trying to fall asleep as he stirred against him.

“Thirsty.”

He rolled his eyes and moved away again. He let his body guide him out of the room. Pausing at the couch, he quickly spread out the quilt before going upstairs.

The house was quiet. His parents had been out the night before. No one was awake. He snatched a bottle of water from the fridge and then quickly went downstairs again.

He had already drank half the bottle before he handed it to Poe.

“Well, good effort,” Poe said, squinting at the bottle before drinking the rest of it. “Who the fuck was texting you?”

“Hux,” he mumbled, curling up next to him.

“Fuck that guy.” Poe tossed the empty bottle away. It felt like he was asleep again when he joined Kylo’s embrace.

The next time he woke up he realized that he forgot to close the guest room door. He could hear the dog scratching at the backdoor and groaned. He had to do everything. Leaving a very comfortable position, he snatched up his phone. 7.45. Fine.

“Hey, I’ll be back,” he said. He reached for his jeans and cringed at the broken painting. He shrugged it off as he found his shirt. Poe didn’t respond, still asleep.

He met his father’s sleep-deprived eyes in the back entrance, both of them still fighting with their clothes.

“Well, do you want to walk him more than I do?” Han asked, rubbing his eyes. He looked so much older than Kylo thought he could ever be. Dads should live forever.

Kylo just stared at him, clenching his fists at the voices telling him to go on, but his own voice being drowned out. He was the only one that wanted to keep this a secret. But it was only fair; the others were right. “Maybe together?”

Han shrugged on his coat, still looking unsteady before he leaned against the doorframe. He gave him a recognizable look, the one that meant promises would be kept rather than broken. He was more familiar with it now than he had been before. “Sounds good to me.”

He hadn’t really noticed that summer was coming, but the morning air hit him hard. He’d slipped on his shoes without socks. He hid his hands in his hoodie as the dog guided them down the alley. He was gripping at his wrist, aching for some other comfort at that moment as they walked together. Their footsteps broke the Saturday morning air. There had been moments like this before, when he was small. He’d run ahead, not caring who would stop him. He remembered his father laughing rather than yelling. There were memories here too and he’d been denying them for too long.

“Hey, dad,” he started and stopped. “I mean, Han.”

Han turned and smirked at him. “Funny, I was getting used to you calling me that.”

They stood in the bright May morning in their back alley, metres apart. Han was holding the dog’s leash and Kylo’s hands were hidden in his sweater. He was almost as tall as his father now. He was going to be taller. He could meet his eyes and tell him this.

“I used to think that this wouldn’t help Rey but now, I…” he looked absently at the dog, trying to focus on anything but the feelings building in his chest. He took a deep breath and met Han’s eyes. “I need to tell you what happened to us.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Teenage boys kissing; boy/boy oral sex; mentions of past sexual abuse, rape, murder, self-harm, etc. it's in the tags.
> 
> This chapter has been written and re-written several times so that's why some parts feel short or jump around too much and also why it's so long. Thanks for hanging with me on this one, guys. I've finally worked through how to get beyond Chapter 26 and into the Reylo angst as our main boy and girl age up into more...compatible territory.


	22. Chapter 22

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo's confessions to his father bring up new emotions for Rey, and the possibility for new solutions. 
> 
> Warnings are in the end notes.

 

Rey woke up and enjoyed the lingering feeling of sleep as she rolled to the empty side of the bed. Dad was already up. She was happy that she remembered where she went to sleep the previous night. It was something that she had started focusing on with increasing intensity. Falling asleep in the car after a night out meant waking up somewhere else. It meant a morning with a stomach ache the next day.

Shifting, she looked over at mom. She was asleep, hair spilling out onto the pillow. Rey reached out, making sure that they were both really there. Running her fingers through her hair, she tried to remember the name of another girl who had long and beautiful hair. She was asleep with them, upstairs in the quiet room where they spent most of their time. They were always dirty, but the new kids were clean at first. Kylo was usually the only one who dared and could find them something to eat. He could move silently, avoiding the creaking stairs and floorboards. The girl still had fresh patches of skin; she was shaking and hungry. Kylo had given her the blanket, covering her. She was cold and didn’t have any clothes on, but her skin was still pure.

Kylo had come upstairs then, carefully opening and closing the door. The other two kids in the corner sat up, hoping that he found something, anything to eat.

Giving the new girl a package of crackers, he helped her sit up. The girl gave Rey a piece of the stale, salty food. She was crying again and Kylo was trying to tell her how to weep without making a sound. He touched her hair too, smoothing out some of the blood, making her look more dirty. Rey didn’t want the girl to share the food with her but Kylo didn’t stop her. The room always smelled bad when there were new kids in the house. But Snoke would stop biting her when there was someone new.

Then he told her that he couldn’t help her more than the others and she’d have to figure so much out on her own. And that she was probably going to die because everyone who came there died.

She was gone not long after.

Kylo had helped send her to heaven.

“Hey, Rey.” Mom had blinked awake, sitting up. “You’re crying, sweetheart. How are you feeling?”

“Just remembering.” Rey dropped her head and wiped at her eyes. “Can I go see Kylo now?”

Mom hugged her and sighed. She was tired and needed to go back to sleep. Rey shouldn’t have woke her up. Maybe she shouldn’t go wake up Kylo too.

“Go see how he’s doing,” mom said, lightly touching her cheek. She felt a tear roll over Leia’s finger and frowned. “Get a glass of milk on your way down. There’s chocolate milk in the fridge for you.”

Rey nodded. She hadn’t had any of it last night, wanting to save it for the next day. She got off mom and dad’s bed, feeling her feet hit the cool wooden floor. It was a nice way to wake up most mornings. The floor was always clean; she never got dirt on her feet that would never wash away.

Kylo’s room was empty, the bed still neatly made. She smiled at how his room smelled before going downstairs. Each sound she made seemed louder as she moved the stool in the kitchen to get a glass. Shrugging, she took down two more. The chocolate milk looked bubbly and she didn’t spill anything. She drank hers first; it was helping her calm down. It was sweet. It always reminded her of the first time that she got candy in the house.

Kylo had found it after he’d been locked in the closet for an afternoon. He’d given it to Rey when she remembered him coming back into the room. She’d forgotten why he was in the closet. The candy took away the itchiness. He always hugged her too close when he had been trapped in that small space. Rey had been in there too. It was too dark. That’s why she always needed lights to protect her.

Taking the two glasses, she went downstairs. Someone had slept on the couch and it brought sweetness back to her mouth. Kylo would do that. He’d sometimes like to wake up uncomfortable. He told her he was getting it over with, starting the day with a cramped neck or legs. He was always there with her too.

The door was open, but she still made sure they knew that she was there.

Poe was alone, sitting up in the bed and watching something on his phone. “Hey look, room service.”

She smiled at him, remembering the fun from yesterday. It had been worth it to stay up so late. She didn’t have any nightmares from the movies. She only felt warmth when she thought about sitting on the couch with the two boys. “Where’s Kylo?”

“Think he went out with your dad and the dog.” He took the glass of milk and finished it in three large gulps. “Come here, we can watch something while we wait for him.”

Rey felt bad for drinking Kylo’s milk, but did it anyway. She snuggled next to Poe and breathed him in. He smelt like Kylo too. His hair was messy and he hugged her to him, setting the phone between them. Poe let her watch the show that Rose liked and Rey was trying to make herself like. It was too colourful and noisy. But she heard Poe chuckling at some of the jokes, so it must be okay. Rose would laugh when the characters couldn’t solve a problem and Rey had pointed out how silly it was to have the arguments that they did in their pretend world.

She heard two sets of feet enter the house and the backdoor closed. Poe clicked off his phone and she watched his face fall slightly.

“What’s wrong?” Rey asked, still following the feet around upstairs.

“Just worried about everything.” Poe’s voice was soft, but he wasn’t sounding nothing normal; his hand was twisting his phone on the bed. “I have to go home at some point. My dad really hates me being here all the time, so I’m worried about going home and seeing my mom all beat up. Guess that’s why me and Ky get along. Always trying to be in two places at once but still messing up.”

Rey took his hand. “You don’t mess up. I’m sorry dad was mad at you last night.”

Poe’s eyes darted to their hands and he looked like he was trying to smile, but it faded before it could really start. He turned his head away and stared at the broken picture frame against the wall. “I know. Feelings really suck sometimes, don’t they?”

There were finally footsteps on the stairs and Rey tightened her grip on his hand. Kylo filled the doorway, leaning against it. He didn’t lift his head to look at them, but Rey could see that he’d been crying. His eyes seemed smaller, more away from her. Poe let go of her hand and scrambled off the bed to pull Kylo into a hug. He was whispering things to him, asking if he was okay. He made him sit down on the edge of the bed, but Kylo wasn’t speaking. Rey’s heart kept beating faster with every second of silence.

“It’s okay, Ky, it’s okay.” Poe squeezed his leg, leaning in closer. “What’d you tell him?”

Kylo shook his head. “He wants to talk to us upstairs. I don’t want to talk any more. I think I messed up. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“No, no. We’ll see how it goes, okay?”

Kylo looked away from him, to her. _Dad’s not mad. I’m just tired._

 _Can we sleep and then talk to him?_ Rey tried to come up with anyway to avoid going upstairs.

 _Let’s ask him_. He reached for her hand and she nodded, crossing the covers to sit next to him. _I’m sorry if you can’t answer some of his questions. Don’t feel stupid about it. I don’t know how to answer them either. But we can do it._

They let Poe get dressed, drawing out the final moments before facing whatever was about to happen upstairs. She wished that Kylo would tell her more, what he had said. Did Poe tell him what she had said yesterday? She told him not to. It wasn’t nice to share secrets. Kylo wasn’t supposed to know and now he was upset.

Anger prickled the edges of her eyes and she pulled away from Kylo, going upstairs alone. Her feet were moving without thinking and she wasn’t waiting for them.

Dad was sitting at the table, meeting her with a small smile. “Good morning, Rey.”

“It’s not,” she huffed, folding her arms. Hurt spread throughout her body and came out as tears. “I want Poe to go home. Right now.”

Han moved to grip her shoulder, kneeling down next to her. “What did he do? I just want to talk to all of you. No one’s in trouble, if you’re mad about him about that. I think he did the right thing. They really care about you, Rey. And we do too and we want to talk to you about some things to help you feel better.”

Rey bit her lip, letting her eyes go wide. Now dad was on his side too. Did he understand that Kylo was upset about this? “No. No!”

She grabbed the coffee cup on the table and smashed it on the ground. Sobs broke out of her mouth and she just wanted to be alone. She didn’t want to talk to anyone or answer any questions. There were always too many questions and they made the feelings real. 

Mom’s footsteps snapped her head towards the staircase. “Are you okay, Rey?”

She was wrapped in her comfortable robe, the one that felt good to hug. But Rey didn’t want any hugs or anyone to touch her.

“I want Poe to go home and to stop being Kylo’s friend.” She pouted, sitting down on the floor and pulling her knees under her chin. Leia knelt beside her but kept her hand away.

“I’ll talk to him, okay? Do you want to go for a ride with dad? He’ll take you to get something to eat and then you’ll feel a bit better. Okay?” Mom was talking with the nice voice, the one that usually meant that things would get better, but only after a long time. She finally nodded, rubbing her nose. “Han, take her for a bit. I’ll talk to the boys.”

Han sighed and Rey buried her head against her knees.

“He told me some stuff this morning, Leia. It’s not going to be easy to get that out of him again. I’ll fill you in more when I get back, but our baby girl needs some space and some food.” She heard him move over to her and reached out her arms to be picked up. “Come on, sweetheart. Mom will sort things out.”

Rey let herself go limp in dad’s arms, just wanting to get away from the house. Maybe food would help her aching stomach.

 

-=-

 

They both froze at the sound of a mug breaking upstairs.

Kylo reached for Poe’s hand and felt his body tense in time with his. They were both too tired to go upstairs now. He wished that he was just physically tired. He also wanted desperately to hide: to crawl under the bed and dare his body into panicking over darkness. Opening his mouth had been out of how exhausted he had felt that morning. Their conversation had sat heavy in his chest; he just wanted to get it out, reduce the pressure.

He didn’t expect the words to feel so real when they left his mouth.

And he didn’t expect his father to understand.

He talked about Rey like she wasn’t waiting for him back at the house. She became like any of the other kids back there, coming in and being pulled into suffering that would never end. The first years with her, he’d been left alone. Rey was small, Rey needed to be cared for. The other kids hurt more those years and it was his fault. He couldn’t take the pain for them because he had to protect her. Snoke needed to keep her alive, to keep tying them together with strings of care that he would later pull to break him. Rey must have been two—she was walking and talking—when Snoke took her for the first time. He had to see how he’d scream and fight for her to test whatever twisted game he was playing with their lives.

Snoke hit him with the typewriter. The old man gripped it with both hands and swung it at him as he charged forward. He was too small and weak then. He blacked out. He had headaches for months after, fighting the urge to throw up every time that he was forced to move.

But that pain was drawn to a hot pinprick when he saw the bite marks under Rey’s tattered underwear. How she couldn’t go to the washroom for agonizing days without breaking down into uncontrollable sobs at being hurt and touched.

He was putting his mouth on her, tasting her. The other girls talked about his fingers and how he didn’t care how they cried when he shoved them inside of them. He never told them that he knew that burning as well.

He felt the same rush of nausea in the alleyway, unable to stop the memory or himself in the moment. Two years he’d hurt her; breaking bones, burning her, but also taking her innocence and leaving scars that were too deep. It was the same thing he’d been robbed of too and he couldn’t stop it for Rey. He had fought to forget and wanted her to forget too. He’d tried to teach her how to forget when they were there. There had been no end in sight there and he needed her to stay as his sunshine to pull him through the darkness.

But now she was remembering.

And he needed to stop it permanently this time, not just through forgetting.

That’s what Han said too. That the reports from Maz, the watered down summaries that detailed signs to look for and what they suspected all along, had told them the same thing. But now they could move forward, use the right resources. The councillor at school wasn’t enough and the monthly sessions weren’t going to help Rey as much as she needed. He’d done the right thing by telling him. Poe had done the right thing by forcing him to talk.

The things that he still kept secret were about himself. Rey needed help right now and he’d waited too long because of his own selfish wants and needs. And Poe was helping him. This morning had shown him that he was working through his problems in his own way and it was getting better. Getting so close to him wasn’t a mistake; the intimate way he’d held him and touched him was not turning sex into suffering. Rey was too young to understand all of this. What he had with Poe was his way of getting help. She needed more comfort. And his tears came because he couldn’t give it to her.

“She’s upset with me, shit.” Poe said, standing closer to him. “She just took off.”

He hugged him, still too weak to move but needing the relief. He’d seen the look in Rey’s eyes and could sense her rage. “Then she’s mad at us both. I shouldn’t have talked to dad alone. You should have been there.”

Poe was still in his arms, wearing yesterday’s clothes as well as their sins.

Forward, not backward. He couldn’t fall away now.

When the backdoor slammed shut, Kylo let his shoulders relax. He’d heard the jingle of dad’s keys and the sound of his boots. Rey liked driving in the car. He was going with her to make her feel something other than anger. “Let’s go talk to Leia. Get it over with. I just want to go back to sleep and for it to be tomorrow already.”

“Me too.” Poe let go of his hand and took a deep breath. He mumbled something under his breath and then shook his head. “This has to be about Rey right now.”

He studied how Poe was shifting his weight from side to side, getting uncomfortable by not moving. He finally took his hand again and led him upstairs, letting go at the final step. Leia was sweeping up the shattered mug from the floor and gave them a long and exhausted look. She reflected how they both felt in one short shrug.

“Han took her to get breakfast. And you two must be starving too. Let’s get that out of the way so you can tell me why she’s upset and how we’re going to fix it.” Leia shovelled the broken pieces into the trashcan and leaned against the counter. “Because we have to find a way to make her hurt less.”

Poe cleared his throat and avoided his eyes.

“I can go home, if that makes it better for Rey,” Poe’s voice shook slightly and he folded his arms. “I’m just in the way.”

Kylo’s back went rigid. He shouldn’t feel that way. None of this would be happening without him. He urgently wanted to reach out to touch him, to make the feeling go away, but Leia turned. She eyed Kylo with a distant sadness before looking at Poe. She sat down at the kitchen table and her look firmed.

“We haven’t missed the signs, Poe.” The words made them both take a step closer to one another, panicked hands staying planted at their sides.

But Leia continued. “We’re always devastated about having to send you back there and then seeing you come back to us hungry and covered in bruises. We’re surrounded by how our kids are hurting, but when you’re here all of you are safe and happy. We’re not experts and sometimes love doesn’t fix everything, but we’re trying. Having to see you going through troubles at home when you’re so sensitive is not right. So, right now? It’s okay for Rey to be upset with you. Han will get her to understand or at least calm her down so that she’ll listen and talk. But you’re staying here until the last possible minute.”

He stepped forward, taking a chance.

“Poe can come live here,” Kylo said instantly. “He can be here all the time.”

Leia closed her eyes and he knew he’d said something impossible. “It doesn’t work that way, Ben.”

“I know.” He dropped the fantasy with two defeated words, letting the idea die before it could spread. “I just feel better when he’s here. And he cares about Rey too. He told me what she said and I couldn’t just keep it inside anymore. I’m sorry I waited so long.”

Leia’s eyes briefly lifted, meeting his admission with a small nod. But they always wanted him to talk and now he was. This was despite wanting to bottle it all up again and go back to being quiet.

“Then let’s talk about that.”

Leia made coffee and they decided to sit on the couch rather than the table. Well, Kylo decided for them, he thought to himself as they sat in the same spot as last night. With Leia still in the kitchen, he gripped Poe’s hand for a moment and then pulled away. His hand was soft and held memories that weren’t painful. Poe’s eyes held his for the length of that moment before he turned to focus on the silent television. He understood, Kylo told himself. He could handle what he was about to say.

“That meant a lot to me,” Poe whispered, leaning towards him. “What you said.”

He nodded, not able to find words. Sleep was tempting at that point so he rested is head against Poe’s shoulder and shut his eyes. The house was quiet and empty without Rey there and he needed the warmth of the boy next to him. His mind searched for pleasant feelings rather than the dark tones churning behind his eyes.

“We should just run away,” he mumbled. “Go somewhere and just be alone.”

Poe kissed his forehead, forcing him to sit up.

He had to focus. The words would be different this time, but the feelings would be the same: healing always felt out of reach for him, but he had to get Rey to it. His life would be meaningless if he let her down this time.

 

-=-

 

Rey wasn’t angry when she came home. She was filled with a good breakfast and she’d gotten rid of most of her tears. Dad said that secrets like the one Poe had told Kylo weren’t meant to be kept inside and ignored. Maz also knew that something was making her feel how she was. She tried to replay their last meeting and didn’t think she’d said anything to make everyone so upset. But they were.

Because they cared about her.

She hadn’t done anything wrong, dad had said as he let her take more maple syrup. She got to eat in a restaurant in her pyjamas. It was something that she’d never done before so it felt good to have another moment to cherish and to replace the bad things in her mind.

When they got home, mom and dad hugged for a long time. She sat on the floor, playing with a shoelace that had gotten itself untied because no one cared about it. She left them alone until her heart made her hug them too.

“They’re asleep, upstairs. You should have seen them, Han. I can’t send him home when they’re inseparable like this. I don’t think I would have gotten a word out of Ben without him,” Leia was speaking into Han’s jacket so it was hard to hear, but Rey understood. And her anger from before built a guilt ball in her throat. “But how’s our girl? Everything starting to make sense now, Rey?”

She shook her head. “Dad says I might need to see more therapists? Because Snoke bit me?”

Mom gave her the smile that meant she’d said the right thing. “Yes, but we’ll find a therapist that you like. Maybe someone who will be your friend, and come by the house so we won’t have to drive that far.”

Rey tilted her head. “I can get a new friend?”

She thought again about having to be around kids all of the time. On good days, she liked playing pretend and using her imagination. Last night she’d used her imagination during the game and she had done a good job being little. Nothing hurt when she could go to the good part of her head. The bad part would be shut off.

Focusing in a group, with kids who only had imagination and good parts, that’s when she would get frustrated. It would be like Kylo always said; it was never fair.

“One that you get to pick. After you meet a few of them. You get to pick your friends.” Han knelt down next to her. “Do you want to see the boys? Talk to them or anything?”

She shook her head. “Not right now. Can I go sleep in my room?”

Dad nodded, tapping her shoulder as she left them to be alone. Still, she stopped outside of Kylo’s room and nudged the door open. Kylo’s door never creaked. He wanted to know where everyone was, but the sound only made him angry. It would make him go quiet and he would sit and scribble for a few hours before, now he would just workout. The sounds and smells didn’t bother her. But Kylo was still living there, even as he tried to move away.

Poe was resting on Kylo’s chest, like she normally did. Both of them were asleep. Kylo didn’t even twitch as she stepped closer to the bed.

They just wanted her to get better, to understand her dreams. That’s what dad had said. He sounded like Kylo when he said it. Those were his words. Dad would have put it a different way, a way that made sense to him.

She turned to go, but she heard someone moving on the bed. Glancing over her shoulder, she caught Poe’s eyes as he blinked at her.

“Hey,” he said, carefully moving off of Kylo to sit up. “Where’d you go?”

“Breakfast with dad.” She watched how Poe avoided waking Kylo. She was already whispering. Sometimes, when he slept like this, he wouldn’t wake up right. “Did you have breakfast?”

Poe shook his head. “We were talking too much.”

She stared at him. Before, she had him figured out. The picture in her head was clear. She wanted him to be her friend too. He was nice and always smelt like Kylo. He would make Kylo play the game with her. He should always be around. He could kiss and hug Kylo and fix him. And her new friend, the one that mom and dad promised, might help fix her too. But right now, she only had her fantasy friend. Poe was there right then. She should apologize for being mad at him. But maybe, like Kylo did, she could do it in another way.

“Can you make me unsad too?”

Squinting, Poe rubbed his eyes. “That’s what I’m trying to do. But I needed help. That’s why I told Ky, that’s why he told your dad. I’m sorry. I’m just a kid too, Rey.”

“I know.” She nodded. “I’m sleepy.”

He jutted out his chin. “You want to sleep with us?”

She shook her head. “Alone. Too many thoughts.”

Poe looked like he wanted to say something more, but instead he gave her a single nod. She turned away again to go to her room and didn’t see where he put his head.

 

-=-

 

Kylo rolled over, pulling a comfortable body closer to him. He heard a light groan in response and pulled the form closer. It wasn’t Rey, so he could hold on tighter.

“Ky, shh,” Poe said. “You’re crying, shh.”

He swam up from sleep, not hearing him. He sat back, blinking in the afternoon sunlight.

Poe moved away from him and off the bad, closing and locking the door. His hands squeaked as he crawled back onto the bed, back into his arms. “Hey, what’s happening?”

He shook his head. “I don’t remember. I don’t know what I was dreaming.”

“Whatever it was, it wasn’t real right now. Rey’s home, she’s asleep in her room. She’s okay. I talked to her. If you’re worried about her, it’s okay.” Poe was kissing at the corner of his eyes, reminding him that he’d been crying.

Even though he was leaning into the embrace, he was still shaking his head. “Stop saying it’s okay. I know it is.”

Pulling back, Poe sighed. “Your mom came by to check on us too. I was still awake, after Rey left. She didn’t see anything. She’s worried that talking about all of this will, I don’t know, fuck you up more or something. I didn’t really say anything. I just nodded, like a moron. She’s not even mad about the painting.”

“I slept through everything.” Kylo shut his eyes, flopping down on the pillow. “I don’t sleep like this. I hear everything.”

“Maybe you still heard it? Like, in your dreams?”

He weakly lifted his head, but still focused on the darkness behind his eyelids. “Rey was talking. You were talking. So was mom. But I was seven, starving in a closet and I didn’t have any hands or feet. And then the rest of me kept disappearing.”

Poe hugged him again, telling him that he wasn’t stuck in that body, in that place. “Then you’re still you, you’re still protecting everyone.”

He hummed lightly, turning to pull Poe closer again. “Mom doesn’t like it when I lock the door. Rey doesn’t like it either.”

He felt a light kiss on his forehead. “I think she’s still mad at me.”

Sleep was pulling at him again. It was still so freeing to just be able to sleep when he wanted to. He felt greedy for giving in to it all of the time. To be warm and safe, that had always been a goal. So many of the other kids never got to feel that again.

“How are you doing?” He was kicked in the chest by their conversation from last night. _You wear me out_. “Really.”

A deep and warm breath swarmed around his neck. “Your mom talked to mine. I can stay the night again. But I’m going to catch hell tomorrow because of that. So I’m fucking scared right now. Scared that he’s going to take it out on my mom rather than me. And then there’s you and Rey. And I’m…”

Poe’s voice trailed off, and Kylo felt new tears. Tears that weren’t his.

“Ky, I just want to be with you so bad. So fucking much. But yesterday, today, tomorrow…I’m really just in the way. I should just go home and get what’s coming to me. I should just take it like a man, like he always tells me.” Poe was sobbing, but his voice was a whisper. Kylo just held him, not sure what else to do. He knew how to hold Rey like this. He knew what to do then. “You always ask me what to do, but can you tell me what to do? Please. Please just tell me.”

He didn’t know. His first reaction was to say just that. He met his eyes and they were the eyes of dozens of children who’d asked him the same thing, pleading with him to tell them how to escape this, how to survive. His reaction by the end was to pull away from them, to only protect Rey. He'd have to say to them that there was no end to all of this; they could never go home and their parents had forgotten about them. The world didn't know where they were. That it would only end in him having to see them dead and gone and having to tell Rey that another friend had gone to heaven, even though it was a fucking lie.

But now, there was an end to this. No one was going to kill them if they cried. No one was going to hurt them if they huddled in a corner, searching for comfort.

“You stay. And we talk. And you’ll feel better.” Kylo murmured into Poe’s too-long hair. “And then I’ll go with you when you go home and I’ll kill your dad.”

Sitting back to look at him, Poe blinked through his tears. “What will that fix, Kylo? It will just fuck things up more for you.”

“It will fix things for you.” He stared back. “And I’m unstable. I’ll just get sent away because I’m fucked in the head. But then you can come live here when I get back and…”

“Jesus fucking Christ, Kylo, it doesn’t work that way. Don’t go into your head about this. Don’t go building a fantasy life where everything is just perfect because it won’t be. I’ll have to go back to wherever, probably Florida, back to my mom’s family. Or I’ll end up in foster care. Do you know how fucked up that system is? It’ll be even worse than it is now. Even with rich white people, I’ll still get fucked over.” Poe sat up, pushing him away as he moved. He pulled his legs under his chin, hugging himself. He was making himself look smaller, drawing away into feelings that Kylo kept ignoring. “Just don’t do anything. Except listen to me. I only have to make it through three more years.”

Kylo didn’t take the words in fully because they didn’t hurt. They were just real, being thrown out into the open in rapid strikes. They mirrored his own hateful words when he was angry, upset about something that he couldn’t change. “You want to make it better for me and Rey, shouldn’t we do that for you?”

Poe dropped his head, onto his arms. He shook lightly, quivering. “I can do it on my own.”

He wanted to fight and argue, to hold him down and scream at him. That’s how he did it in the kids in the beginning. When the kids wouldn’t listen. He’d scream at them to be quiet, to just listen. To become a favourite, like he was. Maybe Snoke just liked the way he tasted on that first day. Maybe Snoke kept him around for so many years so he could do it again. He never did, but the fear permeated every day that he was there. He did so many wrong things to keep it from happening again.

“Can we do it together? Fix me and fix you too?” Kylo planned the words carefully. The bright flowers shone through the patches of dead weeds. “And make sure that Rey doesn’t end up like us?”

The other boy’s head shot up, quirking a grin. “There’s no way I’m as fucked up as you.”

His smile was daring, inviting and teasing. Kylo reached up to cup his face, to brush away the look. “You will be, if you keep hanging out with me.”

“That’s the problem. I want to keep hanging out with you. To stay here all of the time, like you said this morning. I fucking want that to be the truth too. I’m just in the way everywhere.” Poe’s eyes drifted from mischief back to sadness. “Fuck, you’re going to hate me because of this.”

It was a direct accusation, telling him how to feel. “No I won’t. I told dad what happened to Rey because of you. Because of you, I feel things again. I just don’t want to hurt myself or other people all the time. I can’t say things like this to Rey and I’m so sorry that I just put it on only you. But I did better this morning. I talked to my dad.”

His face felt warm. He was going to cry again. He couldn’t. He pulled his hands away, jamming them into his eyes.

There were too many feelings in the room. Too many thoughts. He couldn’t sort them out.

The last thing he wanted was for Poe to kiss him, but he let it happen. A warm mouth, salty with tears. He latched onto the feelings in his heart, pouring them into Poe. He shifted against him so they were lying beside one another. His need always came from fear. He was afraid that someone would hear them. He was afraid of what would happen. He was afraid that he’d wake up and be half-dead in a basement in California and still be fourteen. But a welcome, but still confusing, pressure was building in his lower half that he didn’t need that right then. He needed to focus.

“Stop, stop.” He managed to say, still holding on to Poe. “I’m okay.”

Poe dropped his forehead against his, taking a deep breath. He kissed him again, lightly, and then shook his head. He was mumbling to himself again, in hushed words in Spanish. He couldn’t catch a single word. Poe kissed him again and it was sweet and innocent. “I was about to say something dumb. I go too quick, I go too fast. I’m so fucking stupid.”

“Stop,” Kylo answered. “Let’s just go back to sleep. Unlock the door so Rey can come in. And we’ll figure it out when we wake up.”

Poe smiled, a warm and deep one that hit his heart where it was most sensitive. The morning had worn off the hard parts, the bits that were left. But he knew that they’d grow hard again if anyone went away again. “Yeah, we can do that. I’d love to do that.”

He left the bed, leaving Kylo alone. He finally crawled under the quilt on his bed, the one from his grandmother. He heard the door unlock and put his head on the pillow again.

When Poe joined him on the bed, he didn’t care about anyone seeing them when they woke up.

 

-=-

 

Over the next week, Rey got to meet with four different therapists. And she picked the one with the prettiest lipstick, the one that understood why sometimes she wanted to play with dolls, but sometimes she didn’t. Why playing pretend sometimes worked, but then sometimes didn’t. She didn’t have to talk about her dreams about Snoke biting her, or go over why she wanted to keep the memories of the other kids in her head.

They just played with dolls, the ones that Ashoka brought with her.

She had put a white circle of paper over their faces, and then asked if they were okay to play with then.

Kylo had been watching from the stairs and met her eyes when she looked up at him. He gave her a smile that was only meant for her.

_She’s pretty._

Rey nodded. _I like her._

 

-=-

 

“I didn’t mean not to reply the other day.” Kylo hated apologizing, especially when he didn’t mean it.

Hux shrugged. He probably saw through the lie. They were still sitting in the library. Kylo had only found the strength to talk to Hux about the text after Rey had found her therapist. And Poe had come to school with new bruises. And it was Friday now. It was almost a week late, but he still apologized. They’d both be proud of him for that.

“It’s okay. We can talk about it now. You’re doing your part. That’s mostly what I care about.” Hux picked up his notes and read through the part that he’d written again. “Have you read the whole thing already? It’s so boring that I can’t get through it.”

Kylo held back from rolling his eyes and crossed his arms instead. “There’s been a lot going on at home. I read so it doesn’t get to be too much.”

That’s all he’d done the last week. Every night, he’d gone through the stupid thick book and tried to make the words make sense. Rey was sleeping in her room and Poe could only text, not come over. He refused to cut himself, stopping himself from finding release. Instead, he looked at the words and then the explanations in the margins. He focused on putting himself in understanding their emotions, their actions. He would write about the book, then about Rey, and then about Poe. And then he’d finally fall asleep at 3 a.m. and have to get up three hours later to take a shower and get ready for school.

Hux let the paper rest on the table. His eyes were sincere when he looked at him. “How’s Rey?”

He bit his lip, letting his leg shake under the table. “She’s got a new therapist. Some things started coming up.”

The bell rang and he expected Hux to bolt from the table. Instead he sat there and was still looking at him. “That sounds like it sucks.”

“Yeah it does.” He shut his eyes. He was free now. He could go and see Poe then. He needed the weekend. They both did. All _three_ of them did. “I thought that you didn’t have my number anymore.”

Hux was slow in gathering his notes, still leaving half of them spread on the table. Those were the ones meant for him. “I still do. I never deleted it. Can you, um, email me this for us next time? I have most of this on my computer too. My email’s on the class list.”

The other boy met Kylo’s eyes and he forced a nod. “I write them out like this and then type them up and it takes forever. I still suck at the computer.”

“You don’t get better at anything without practice,” Hux said, actually stopping to smile at him. But the look quickly faded. “Hey, I’ll see you on Monday. Say hi to Rey for me.”

Kylo sat back, feeling the headache spread to his nose as Hux disappeared from the library.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mentions of past rape, child abuse, sexual abuse against a child, and teenage boys kissing.
> 
> Bless everyone for continuing to read this. This is heavy shit and I'm doing the best I can to navigate it.


	23. Chapter 23

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Han and Leia make a decision that threatens the boys' relationship; Rey gets to know her therapist.
> 
> Read the tags and Chapter Notes for warnings. There are some spoilery things in the notes as well, since I've updated the tags...

 

Kylo was halfway down the stairs, his thoughts elsewhere as he pulled on his jacket, when he heard his father clear his throat. It was Saturday. They didn’t have any plans as a family and he slowed his pace at the final step. He was supposed to meet Poe in the park so they could laugh at the other boys trying to skateboard and then take a walk. He’d actually put on a white shirt for a change, looking forward to the afternoon of doing nothing. Hux had already sent him three emails correcting certain parts of the assignment and he was determined to ignore them.

“Hey, Kylo, can I talk to you?” He was sitting at the table, looking guilty about something. Kylo could read it in his shoulders.

And by the way that he didn’t call him Ben.

He wanted to frown, but also didn’t want to react. Instead, he looked at him blankly. “I’m going to be late.”

“The park doesn’t close, son.” His father shifted the chair next to him away from the table, motioning for him to join him. “Sit down.”

His father rarely talked to him like this. It was exactly like Poe had said; they tried to avoid confronting him directly and would rather deescalate everything before it devolved into him screaming at them. He could still do it. He hadn’t done it in so long, but the feeling still loomed in his mind. He’d given them the space that they’d earned and could take it away.

Openly groaning, he slumped down in the chair. “What?”

Han sat back and sighed. “It’s about your friend, Poe.”

He sat up and folded his arms, trying to disguise his posture. His hands were instantly clenched into fists. Staring at his father, his mind went through dozens of possible responses to whatever was coming. His top response at that moment was just to run away if the conversation was going _that_ way. They had kissed, they had made out, but it was all just a part of this type of friendship. They were friends in that way. There wasn’t anything wrong with him, neither of them. Opening the box of sex in front of his father wasn’t on any level nearly as terrifying as being threatening with death, but this was the real world. This was the outside. He’d seen so many bad movies and was trying to steady his reactions around mirroring the characters. He had a friend and he liked to kiss him. He would just say that.

“We put a call into the police, letting them know what’s going on at his house. This can’t keep going on and we thought…”

He hadn’t been prepared enough. He hadn’t come to this conclusion. He’d been stupid again.

“What!” Kylo stood, knocking the chair back. His mind locked into instant panic, killing the nervous calm that he’d latched on to earlier. “Why did you do that? He told me not to do anything! He’s going to blame me!”

“Take a breath and calm down.” Han was still sitting down, which frustrated Kylo more. He couldn’t be calm about this. This was going to ruin everything. “He’s not going to be in any trouble, but they might be able to help him.”

“The police don’t help anyone.” He ground his teeth together and glared at his father. “You know that.”

Han sighed and shook his head. “Ben, if he’s being abused, you should want to help your friend too. We should have done this a long time ago.”

Rolling his eyes, he tossed up his hands. “Of course I want to help him! But I’m doing it my own way. I don’t need your help with this.”

Taking two long strides, he was at the stairs down to the back entrance. His hand gripped the doorframe as his thoughts caught up with his feet. “Maybe you want to get him in trouble. Maybe you don’t want him to be around me anymore.”

Han finally stood, meeting his eyes. “That’s not what’s happening here. We’re happy that you two are close and can talk about these problems, the feelings that you have. There haven’t been any problems at school the last few months. You’re eating more. You’re talking to us. We want to make sure he doesn’t go away, but also to make sure that he’s safe.”

Narrowing his eyes, Kylo shook his head. His father would have said something more if he had any idea about what was going on. “Go fuck yourself.”

He had never slammed the door harder than he’d done when he left the house. This was why he didn’t say anything to his parents. It just made things worse. They hadn’t changed at all. They were just doing things for their own interest, not his. All they had to do was leave him alone and he’d be fine. They were finally taking care of Rey because of him, not because of anything they’d figured out on their own. Why did he always have to do everything? Frustrated, he ran most of the way to the park.

His head hadn’t cleared by the time he jogged up to the path where they were supposed to meet. Stopping, he clenched his hands and tried to calm his breathing. But he was still gulping down air when he spotted Poe at the top of the children’s jungle gym. He was balancing between two bars, laughing with a younger boy who hung below him. He wouldn’t be goofing off if he were upset.

Inhaling heavily, he went over to get his attention.

“Hey, you’re early,” Poe grinned, dropping down to the ground. He’d stumbled and fallen in the dirt. He was still brushing his jeans clean when he quirked his head, still smiling. “Did you run here? Fuck’s sake. What happened?”

He just shook his head. He hadn’t felt this angry in a long time. He’d have flashes of rage and was annoyed a lot of the time, but this sort of anger had been something that he thought he’d shaken. “Come on.”

Shoving his hands into his jacket pocket, he led the other boy to the bench furthest from the other people in the park. Children were laughing and playing. The distant sounds of skateboards hitting pavement knocked him back to why they were supposed to be there.

“Ky, you’re freaking me out,” Poe said, sitting beside him. “Are you okay? Is it Rey?”

“My parents,” he started and then breathed in again. “They called the cops on your dad.”

Poe was on his feet again in a heartbeat, an awful, hateful heartbeat. Poe’s mood snapped in that vicious moment. “Why did they do that? Did you tell them to do that?”

“No,” he argued back, standing again. “No, I fucking didn’t. My dad just told me and it pissed me off.”

“Yeah, that makes two of us.” Poe squeezed his eyes shut and shifted his weight, his hands rolling into fists. His shoulders quivered for a moment. “Fuck!”

Too many heads turned to look at them.

“What the fuck are you looking at?” Poe yelled again. He’d never really seen him angry like this before. His twisted from yelling at the others in the park back to him, cheeks red and eyes furious. “Let’s go somewhere I can scream in peace.”

He nodded, too numb to make a response. Leaving the ordered lawn and paths, he heard Poe stomping through the brush surrounding the park and into the real nature that surrounded it. He was cursing the entire time under his breath until they reached a fallen tree and he sat down, crossing his arms over his knees. Kylo loomed over him, trying to decide how to comfort him. His eyes were narrowed at the ground and he was biting the inside of his mouth. He wasn’t crying, but he was about to.

Dropping beside him, he put his arm around him. “I really didn’t tell them to do that.”

Poe shrugged. “Doesn’t matter if you did or didn’t. It’s still going to make things really fucking shitty at home. And I’ll probably get taken away again unless I lie my ass off. And I don’t want to lie for him again.”

“Is that really why you moved before?” He asked, keeping his voice low. All of his hate was at his parents at that point. His arm tightened as a reflex.

“Yeah. Different part of town. Different neighbours. Different cops. Same old dad.” He took a shaky breath and leaned towards him. “I’m so fucking mad at your parents right now and they’re only doing the right thing, what you’re supposed to do.”

Kylo’s frown deepened. “It’s not fair.”

“Yeah, it’s not. But I’m used to it. I’m actually doing okay at school for once. For once, I’m actually happy and not just faking it. I have friends. I have…you. If I have to fucking move again, I’ll just say fuck it all and run away. I’m tired of being a pussy about this. Mom can get herself out.” He bit his lip, hard. Kylo was drawn into the emotion, wondering if he looked the same when he was this mad. “As long as we’re together, I’ll be okay.”

“I don’t want you to leave either.” Kylo found the easiest words to say. “I really didn’t want this to happen.”

Poe shifted away from him to wipe his nose. His silence made Kylo’s arm twitch and he leaned closer to him. Poe finally shook his head and stood. “Maybe it’s not the end of the world. But it’s going to be really annoying as fuck.”

He extended his hands, lifting Kylo to his feet as well. They both silently agreed to turn off their phones and continued through the small grove of trees. The sun was warm and the crunching of brush on the old trail was another welcome distraction, but Kylo couldn’t shake how easily they both had fallen into anger at the thought of being separated. He shouldn’t have become this attached; it made him weak. Hux had betrayed him over lesser things, despite how he was acting now. Still, he swallowed the heavy thought of losing another friend over something his parents had done. He couldn’t hate them; he needed them to help Rey.

Frustrated, he kicked a rotten log, making Poe turn. He smirked and took the two steps toward him to kick it too.

Kylo had been through these woods before.

He had an idea of where they were going.

The trail finally ended at the edge of an outcropping of rocks at the centre of a large hill. The cliffs of stone cut into the hillside, breaking it up the ridge into a jagged escarpment. He remembered his father complaining about how developers wanted to wipe out the small oasis of nature in the town and felt heat warm his face again. He didn’t want to apologize this time.

They spent the rest of the afternoon climbing the large and jutting rocks, slowly reaching the top of the hill. His longer arms and legs made finding the right hand holds easier and he’d reach down to help his friend up to the next level. They didn’t talk, but would laugh when one or the other stumbled. The final climb to the top left them holding hands, looking down at the woods and park in the distance.

“The fun part will be getting down.” Poe stepped away from him, giving him a light grin. He sat down and started to pull at the blades of faded yellow grass of the plateau. “Do you come here a lot?”

Shrugging, Kylo sat down across from him. He didn’t want to talk about memories right then, still so close to anger, but he had to. It had been too quiet for too long. If he didn’t say anything, Poe would think he was mad at him. He wasn’t, but the climb had churned up the past again. Maybe talking about it would make it go away. “Now and again. But I did more when I was a kid. It was harder then.”

“But you still made it to the top?” Poe asked, organizing the blades of grass on the leg of his jeans.

“Not every time.” He smiled, watching Poe’s eyes. He turned away from the reaction, looking at the grass. “But I was a really stubborn kid. Leia would stand at the bottom and yell at me to be careful.”

Licking his lips, he brushed the grass from his jeans. He didn’t want to be thinking about those moments right now, but they still landed in his mind. He knew that if he lifted his head, he’d still see old ghosts there, haunting him.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, just…sometimes things come back to me from before. Maybe that’s why I like hanging out with you so much. You don’t remember who I was before and don’t bother me about it.” He swept his hair back, trying not to sound bitter. “I missed everything for seven years. If I wasn’t able to shut off parts of my mind and just focus, I’d be so much more fucked up right now.”

“And that’s why you have the down days, yeah,” Poe said and his head snapped up to glare at him. “Hey I figured it out. Even though I’m mad at your parents right now, I think that they’re proud of you. And kind of understand why you just shut down sometimes. They’d probably know more if you told them.”

The words prodded at him, making him slip from being neutral. “I have to figure everything out on my own.”

“Ky,” Poe tilted his head. “I’m on your side here. Just trying to do my job of getting you closer to normal at the same time.”

He let himself relax into a sigh, but dark thoughts still swam up his chest. “Do you think you’d have survived if you were there?”

“Me?” Poe laughed. “I would have gotten my ass killed right away. If you think I mouth off now, you should have seen me when I was seven.”

Kylo managed to smirk, then looked back at his jeans. He didn’t know how right he was. But the thought quickly pulled him back down, down the stairs into the basement. How heavy his feet felt. How much his hands hurt. What blood tasted like when it splashed into his mouth. The aching smell of dead leaves that permeated the house. How easily hair fell off a scalp when he pulled on it too hard, trying to move too fast to avoid a beating…

“Hey, don’t go there.” Poe’s hand covered his. “Stay here with me.”

He blinked out of the darkness and nodded. Poe nudged him to lie down on the grass and rested his head on his shoulder.

They stayed that way until dark, talking when they felt like it.

It was the only thing that they could do to avoid going home.

 

-=-

 

Ahsoka took her to the mall. The last two weeks they’d mostly just be at the house or the park, but she wanted to go somewhere with a lot of people today. Rey got to miss half a day of school; part of her felt sorry for her teacher, that she wouldn’t be there to help clean up at the end of the day. But another part of her was glad to be on her own with a grown-up.

They got frozen yoghurt and sat on a bench, watching everyone walk by.

“We isn’t everyone at work?” Rey asked. It had been bothering her all afternoon. There were adults and kids, mostly her age. There were even some teenagers. Kylo hated the mall so she didn’t bother looking for him. “Mom and dad go to work during the day. They can’t just go to the mall and do nothing.”

Ahsoka took a long lick from her spoon. She got chocolate. Rey got blackberry. She was still deciding if she liked raspberries better. “Maybe they took a day off to go shopping. There was something important that they needed to buy. Maybe they only work in the mornings or evenings. Everybody has their own story. Want to make up some?”

Rey nodded. “Poe works in the mornings or nights so he can go to school. Kylo doesn’t like it.”

Smiling, Ahsoka put her yoghurt down. “Look at that lady over there. The one with the purple sweater. What do you think her story is?”

Rey followed Ahsoka’s eyes and found the lady who she was talking about. She had a brown purse with a big keychain on it. Rey could see it from far away. It looked like something from a vacation maybe, like the pictures she’d seen from when mom and dad and Kylo had taken trips when he was younger. She wanted to take a vacation like that; dad had promised her that she would swim in the ocean that summer. Rey was holding him to that promise, asking to look up trips on his computer. Shaking her head and trying to focus, Rey looked at the lady again. She looked annoyed, frowning at her watch. She was waiting outside of a shop that sold books and paper. Rey had been in there with Kylo, when he was looking for a new notebook.

“She’s waiting for someone.” Rey sat up straighter to get a better look at her. “He’s probably late. Maybe she’s waiting for her husband and he’s always late?”

Ahsoka nodded. “I think she has a husband too. I don’t have a husband, but that lady does. Look how stressed out she looks: how she’s standing and folding her arms. Where do you think they live?”

“In a nice house. Her clothes are nice so she must have a nice house.” Rey liked imagining where other people lived because it was a real place; it wasn’t like playing pretend when places could be anywhere. Mom had taken her to a few open houses. That’s when people were trying to sell their houses and they looked really nice and clean. But the best house was their house.

“What does she like to do for fun?” Ahsoka was smiling at her, encouraging her to keep thinking more.

Rey lifted her head again, looking at the shopping bags in the lady’s hands. “She just bought a book. She likes to read. Kylo likes to read and he’s doing a good job with helping me learn. I like reading too, but not as much as him.”

“He writes a lot too, right?” Ahsoka took her empty yoghurt cup and put it with her own on the side of the bench. Rey hopped down and put both containers in the trash. “What does he write about?”

She looked at her shoes. “A bunch of stuff. He writes about school and his friends. He writes about me, how he’s feeling. Sometimes he writes happy stuff. He smiles about it so I know he’s feeling better. He also writes about the bad things and gets sad. I’m not allowed to read those.”

“Do you like to write things down? Your memories?”

Ahsoka helped her back onto the bench as Rey thought about the question. “I like drawing better. I don’t always see things when I read or when Kylo reads to me.”

“I like drawing too. I have so many sketchbooks. I just love to fill them up with what’s in my head so I can think about them in a different way, to figure out what they mean. Sometimes my mom will look at them and see something totally different.” She looked up as a young woman hurried up to the lady and hugged her and they walked away. “She comes up with a different story.”

Rey frowned and then shook her head. “My friends get scared of my drawings. Sometimes I have to draw Snoke to make the picture done. But I don’t draw his face. Rose thinks that he’s even scarier without a face.”

“Yeah, that’s pretty scary to some people, especially kids. When I was in college, we learnt all kinds of stuff about how to understand why people are afraid of certain things and what it means. Why do you think Rose is afraid of people without faces?” Ahsoka’s voice was always happy, even when it shouldn’t be. And it wasn’t fake either. She wasn’t like her teacher at school who pretended to be happy to try to make them feel better about having to sit still all day.

“She can’t see who they are and she can’t know them?” Rey was guessing now, but hoped she gave the right answer.

“Yeah, that’s what I was thinking too. Rose likes to know people. She was really friendly when I met her. I like your friend Finn too.”

Rey grinned. It had been fun to play with her friends and have Ahsoka be there to play too. She brought a really neat set of blocks with different types of food on them. She could build a house and plan a meal at the same time. Finn and Rose thought that the blocks were boring, but still helped her.

“They like you,” Rey said, reaching out to take Ahsoka’s hand. This had been last week. They were playing in the living room and Kylo and Poe came downstairs. Poe hadn’t met Ahsoka yet until that day. He had been in trouble with his dad and was finally allowed to come over again, but only one night a week and he could never stay over. They spent almost the entire time in Kylo’s room or the basement, being alone together. “Do you like them?”

“Yep!” Ahsoka squeezed her hand. “It’s good to have friends, right? And you’re not mad at Kylo’s friend anymore either?”

She shook her head. “Kylo talked to me about him, why he’s been sad lately. Mom and dad called the police and they went to his house. But they didn’t find anything and his dad made him lie. And it made Kylo sad for a while. But he can come over again, so I guess it’s fine.”

“Hm. Did that make you worried?”

She looked at Ahsoka’s nails. They were a different colour every time that they met and Rey thought it was pretty cool that she took the time to do something like that. Mom painted her nails too, but it was always the same colour each time. “I don’t like it when Kylo’s upset. It makes my stomach hurt.”

“And then you have the nightmares? The ones about Snoke touching your vagina?”

Rey bit her lip. Ahsoka had explained what Snoke had actually done to her, making sure that the words were the right ones. Kylo was mad that she’d done that, but Rey told him that it felt better to know the truth about her memories. How it wasn’t her fault, and not his fault either. Snoke was an evil man who hurt their bodies and their bodies were special. Rey shouldn’t let anyone hug her if she didn’t want them too. That’s why it was important to make sure that if she wanted to kiss anyone at school again, she had to make sure that the person really wanted it.

“How do I make them go away? The bad thoughts? Maz says it will take time and that I need to talk about them and how they make me feel.”

Ahsoka nodded. “I agree with Maz. But you can also think about the memories as something that you can’t control. They’re the past. But the future? That’s something you can help make real. And you don’t want those memories to keep following you, right? You’re not going to forget the other children if you remember the happy things over the bad things.”

“I’m in control now? Like when I tell Kylo what to do?”

“Well, he’s having trouble making up his mind. You can help him make a decision, but you shouldn’t really be making decisions for him. He helps you make choices too. You need to be a team and figure out how to make the future better than the past.” Ahsoka tilted her head. “Then again, I can’t tell you what to do either. But I can give you advice since I’m older and have gone to school for a very long time to help kids like you.”

“I like that you help kids, Ahsoka. It’s really nice.” Rey smiled. “I’m glad we’re friends.”

Ahsoka fixed her hair and nodded. “Come on, let’s go figure out what we want for lunch.”

Rey took her hand and led Ahsoka toward the food court. Food would always cheer her up.

 

-=-

 

The past two weeks were more annoying than Kylo had expected. Rey met with her therapist every other day. She was always at the house. Poe met her last Friday and she asked how he was doing. He had shrugged and said he was doing okay and they went back to his room.

Kylo was more angry at his parents for calling the police than he was at Poe for lying. He didn’t tell them to call; they had decided that for him. He was just pissed off that Poe couldn’t spend as much time with him the last two weeks. He really didn’t want to argue with him about it when Rey was there but Poe wouldn’t let it go. Poe had to lie. His mom didn’t have anywhere to go.

The last thing he needed was child services poking around.

That’s when they got into an argument. It only ended when Kylo promised that he’d think about telling his family about their friendship. That at least got Poe onto his lap and kissing him again. They were alone and they shouldn’t be arguing the entire time. Poe still thought that they should tell Rey about them and he had to explain that it was a bad idea right then. She had a new therapist and was talking about new things. She’d be even more confused.

Now, this Friday, he didn’t bring it up. He was quiet, but blamed it on being tired. But he still smiled and embraced him tightly in his room. They were going to the movies. He still shouldn’t be driving him around like he did, but he didn’t care. They had more freedom when they could do what they wanted.

Standing in the lobby, Kylo studied how Poe was looking at him before he looked away to roll his eyes at the strange look. He was starting to know when he really wanted him to quit whatever he was doing, and when he was asking for some sort of stimulation to pull him out of the sights and sounds around him. The movie theatre had too many kids from their school, hanging around and being useless.

He caught a flash of red hair out of the corner of his eyes and saw Hux moving across the complex’s floor. Hux paused to look at him, his eyes level and searching for a reaction.

Kylo offered a light wave, aching for a good sign. He knew that hope was useless, but the last few weeks had been good. Even during their presentation that week, Paige had said that they seemed like friends again. They weren’t, but Hux seemed to want something from him again. Unless he had been completely lied to.

Hux waved back and then disappeared with his father.

Poe stopped to look at where his eyes were. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah. I just…got…” he trailed off, losing grip on what he wanted to say. “Yeah. Let’s go.”

Their theatre was empty. The movie was terrible but it gave them extra space to be themselves. Poe rested his head on his shoulder, holding his hand. He was touching him more, probably because they were alone.

“I like you,” Poe whispered when the movie got really boring.

Smirking, Kylo leaned over to kiss him, then turned back to the screen. Poe put his head back down and Kylo sighed. School was finally almost over. If he could convince Poe to quit his job and just take money from him instead, things would be perfect. If the police stayed away, it would be even better. He’d be able to lie and say that he still had his job, but he wouldn’t have to be away from them all of the time. He’d told Poe about the settlement, how it finally came through from the government. He had felt bad at first about it; the other kids didn’t get anything like that and he’d been the one to put them into the ground, into the barrels. And now he and Rey were getting money because of it. Agent Jinn had explained it in his email that it was a chance for him and Rey to live the lives that the other children didn’t get a chance to have. Use it for college.

He was going to. But it was a lot of money.

The movie ended and he slumped down in his seat. “That really sucked.”

Poe was playing with his phone and only glanced up to grin at him. “That was the point. We can make out without anyone watching.”

“We’re not really making out,” Kylo answered. “I hardly touched you.”

“But you wanted to.” Poe was teasing him with his eyes. “At least this part is getting easier, right?”

He nodded, feeling himself blush. They’d still have to stop all the time; Kylo would withdraw into his own head when things go to be too much. The time apart hadn’t helped. He was alone in his bed too often, worried about Rey in the next room. If she had a bad nightmare, she’d still come into talk to him. But he’d wake up alone. There were too many things to feel, too many boxes to go through to find the right ones and where they should go.

Reaching out, he gripped Poe’s knee. The last two weeks hadn’t just been annoying. They had meant too much time spent alone with his thoughts. Poe grinned, leaning over and picking up the phone to take a picture of them together. He really didn’t like getting his picture taken, but he had forced a smile just to see Poe’s get wider. He looked at the picture and could only focus on how the other boy looked. He was happy in the picture. The screen showed them both smiling, their heads resting together.

“We look good together, right?” Poe grinned. Kylo watched as Poe set it as the background of his phone. He wanted to tell him not to, but the joy in his face as he looked at his screen made him pause.

Poe quickly leaned down to kiss him and he lost his objection fully.

“I’m glad we’re friends,” Kylo said when they parted.

Poe quickly looked away, down to his phone, then back to him. “That’s…that’s good. I like you, Kylo. A lot. I…this is a nice picture. I know you don’t like them but it means a lot to me. Things are getting less awful at home now so I like that we’re together when we can be.”

There was a sadness in the other boy’s voice that made Kylo worried that he’d misunderstood something. Kylo reached for his hand and squeezed it. Touching helped.

“I actually like it,” he smiled lightly, looking over, confident he was solving the problem. “The picture.”

Poe was still focused on his phone. “Yeah. Me too. Ky, are you happy more with me than you were before?”

He’d been thinking about this the last nearly three months. It felt good to have different things to think about. Being with Poe, talking to him, and learning how to deal with his own body in private moments were better than being alone and wanting to hurt himself and others. Getting done with the project with Hux had also given him the tiniest hope that he’d be his friend again. The girls were wondering what was going on and he wanted to tell them, but it was easier to keep things in his head for a while longer. They’d have the summer to work through the rest of their friendship. Poe wanted him to tell Rey and he still couldn’t find the right words to describe what they had, but the summer might be time for that. Rey liked Ahsoka; she was sleeping in her own bed more, but it wasn’t to be mean to him. She needed to think about her nightmares first before she told them about how they made her feel.

“I’m happy. Are you?” He didn’t want to ask the question, but the look in Poe’s eyes told him he’d hear the answer anyway. “I think that you’re happy that we’re friends most of the time. That you don’t regret being here for me and Rey.”

“Of course I don’t regret it. I just…yeah, I’m happy. It tough right now, but yeah…” Poe trailed off, looking back at his phone. “Ky, what am I to you?”

Kylo slowly digested the question in the lit and empty theatre. He’d just said that he was his friend. What more was there? “You’re…someone I care about. And I don’t really care about a lot of people. You know that. You’re my best friend and you…mean a lot to me. That’s why I got mad at my parents when I thought that you’d have to go away.”

Poe leaned over and kissed his cheek. “Thanks. That means a lot to me.”

Still, when he sat back, he was focused on his phone. Kylo eyed his hands and how they traced the case in slow patterns.

Poe finally shrugged and stood. “It’s late.” He sounded tired again as he avoided his eyes, motioning for them to go. “My dad’s going to be pissed if I’m late. The cops came by again this week so he’s been a real asshole about it. I’m not mad about it anymore. He won’t hit me if they keep showing up so, maybe this is a better thing than I thought at first.”

Poe kept his distance from him as they left the theatre. Kylo hated having to leave Poe with his parents. Hanging out on Friday evenings were fine; he told his dad he was working and his manager covered for him. But he still couldn’t spend the night. Last week, he’d gotten so frustrated that they cut class and went on the roof to be alone, to hold one another and talk and kiss. It turned into deeper kisses until he was forced to stop himself. They sat on the ledge and looked at the parking lot, holding hands.

Leia hadn’t been pleased with the angry phone call from Mr Dameron about how much time his son was spending at the Solo house and had connected the dots that she’d been the one to call the police.

Still, after a noiseless car ride, Kylo left his friend. The drive home made anxiety start to build that Poe wasn’t sharing something that he was worried about. The other boy was keeping things from him after what had happened with Rey and then with his father. They could be quiet around one another, but most of the time when he was quiet, it was about things neither of them could control.

Finally at home, Kylo sat on the back porch and waited to go inside. The sky was still and the nights were getting warmer. Once school was over, he’d have too much time to think. He’d have to ask his teachers about which books they’d be reading and what to study before the fall. If it were something that he hadn’t encountered before, it would be hard to do well in it. He had to plan.

His phone buzzed. Instead of Poe, it was from Hux.

_Good to see you tonight. Can I talk to you sometime this week?_

_About what?_

Had Hux seen something? Their showing had been empty and he’d been across the theatre at a different movie. He had followed him with his eyes to make sure.

_You seem so much better now and I need to talk to you more. I might be moving back to mom’s._

Frowning, Kylo glared at the bright screen as he texted back. _Ok._

Ignoring the next message, he texted Poe instead. _I miss you_.

He didn’t get a reply.

He stared at his phone for fifteen minutes and finally gave up to go upstairs to talk to Rey.

She was sitting on her bed, colouring in a new sketchbook. It must have come from her therapist.

“Hey,” he said, sitting down next to her.

“Hi.” She looked up at him and grinned. “Do you like it?”

Even the pencil crayons were new. Rey was drawing their house. “Pretty good. Can I add something?”

Rey tilted her head and nodded, her smile broadening. “Yeah.”

He could focus on Rey and doing this rather than the weight of his phone in his pocket. He sketched their mailbox, adding in the perspective of the driveway out front of the house. Rey sat up and watched him draw, sitting back as he took the green crayon to add details to the lawn.

“Do you colour a lot with your new therapist?” He asked, reaching for something outside of himself again. Every time he moved, he thought his phone buzzed. But they were just ghost thoughts and wishful thinking.

“Yeah. We draw, but we also make up stories about people. And we talk about the names for parts of bodies and why some touches make us feel bad and makes us upset,” Rey said, lying down to add tiny swirls of flowers along side the front of the house. “Ahsoka thinks that you made me forget what happened when we were there.”

He winced, squeezing the pencil. He kept his hand steady, though, adding in more lines to the driveway to distract himself. “That was when I thought that we would never get out of there. I didn’t want you to hurt all of the time. I couldn’t stop it and it was killing me. You were so little and so special to me and Snoke did those things to you to hurt you, but also to hurt me. I’m sorry I made up stories and lied to you. And I’m sorry I waited so long to say something. But it’s…important that we talk about these things so we can help your nightmares. And so your stomach stops hurting.”

She had to get better. She had to grow up, but not as quickly as she wanted. She was happier when she didn’t remember but that only created more hurt and pain for the future version of her that he could see in his mind. Her face would be leaner, but her cheeks would still be full. Her hair would hang loosely on her shoulders. She would never frown and would love the sunshine.

Rey bit her lip, grabbing a different colour to draw a sun shining in the corner of the picture. “He was raping the older girls. But just touching and biting me. I feel bad about that.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and put the pencil down. “Because they hurt more?”

“And then they died before it got better.” She reached for his hand. “Why are we the only ones allowed to get better?”

Studying the new nail polish on Rey’s fingertips, he frowned. “We’re the only ones that got out because I wasn’t strong enough to save everyone. I hate the things I had to do and everything that happened to us. I hate it so much that I wear people out talking about it. And I want you to get better and be stronger so I don’t wear you out too. You get so sad when I’m upset so I’m trying to get better. Trying to move on.”

“You talk to Poe about this,” Rey said after a long silence. He could hear the furnace kick in as rain started to pelt the window. “Are you afraid you wore him out?”

The confession in the hotel room, followed by the warmth of the other boy’s mouth on his, flashed in his mind and he nodded. He looked at Rey and opened his mouth to tell her everything: how they kissed and hugged and how they had gone further, almost to the point where he thought he’d never get again. How this type of friendship was important to him too, but how he was petrified of losing them both if he told Rey and she was hurt by it. And now Poe’s distance was pressing on him too. How he was less angry having someone to talk to who was his own age: someone who wanted him around, until he started causing so much trouble for him. How all of this was so confusing that he couldn’t sleep, especially with her taking space away from him too. But he shut his mouth and just nodded. “Yeah. He’s worried about Han and Leia calling the cops on his dad. I talk to him a lot and he’s my best friend. But I talk more to Maz now too. And it felt…good to talk to dad. When I apologized to him finally this time.”

He had come from the hike after dark. He’d walked Poe to his block, looking distantly at his house. They embraced on the street and Kylo had to make the long walk back to his house alone. He had come inside, glared at his family on the couch and went upstairs to take a shower. He was just getting dressed when his father had asked to come in. Sitting on his bed in his boxers and a t-shirt, he waited for ten minutes before he finally gave up and let him in. Kylo knew that he was pouting throughout most of the conversation, still lingering in the thought of being betrayed. But Han assured him that they were really just doing the right thing. And Kylo had to tell him what Poe had said to him that afternoon. And how they were both afraid. Han gripped his shoulder, saying that it would be okay. Even if he had to move somewhere else, they’d still be friends and he’d make sure that they’d be able to see one another. He had numbly nodded, not wanting to argue. But when the tears came, he leaned against his father. He couldn’t lose him. Not now.

Han spotted one of the worst scars on his thigh and took a long, deep breath. It was a jagged and harsh scar that was deep and wouldn’t fade like the smaller ones. He told him how it was easy to forget what he’d been through for them; and he was sorry for letting that get away from them. The world was always moving so fast and they sometimes needed to stop and remember how far he’d come.

Han said he was proud of him. Kylo didn’t believe it.

Rey looked at him for a long time, reading the sadness that was clearly on his face. “But you’re supposed to call the police if someone is being hurt.”

Still back in his bedroom only a couple of weeks ago, he shook his head. “He told me about how he was taken away from his family before, when he was little, for a year, and how it didn’t get better. He always feels in the way.”

“I’m not mad at him anymore. He doesn’t get in the way here.”

 _Yes he does, between you and me_ , Kylo thought darkly, _especially if I don’t tell you everything_. “But you like it when he’s here? When we spend time with you.”

Rey nodded quickly. “Yeah, he made you play the game. It was really fun and I want to do it again the next time we’re together.”

“I think he’d like that.”

He went to bed after hugging Rey, and making sure that she knew she could still come to him if she had a nightmare.

Saturday came and he hadn’t heard from him. Nothing. No reply.

Then Sunday came and there was still no reply to his texts.

Then Poe wasn’t at school on Monday.

And Kylo finally felt the familiar pull towards self-destruction.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Standard warnings: past abuse, mentions of rape and death, boys kissing.
> 
> I've updated the tags to extend the Poe/Kylo chapters mostly because as I've been reworking them, Rey got too little space. Adding more of what she's going through ended up making one chapter totally unmanageable and I needed to split it into two. Chapter 25 needed to be entirely Rey and what had been the end of that needed to be its own chapter, since the old Chapter 26 (now 27) is when things go boom and the second half can begin. 
> 
> Sorry to anyone that wanted this arc over sooner, but rest assured that I've got the chapters mostly finished and Chapters 28 and 29 are mostly done too. Chapter 29 is where we start circling into the outskirts of Reylo territory with Ben and Rey being 23 and 13 so there's not much that can happen then, except plant some seeds that will grow as Rey gets older. I'm not going to update with the amount of chapters there will be to this, but we're probably looking at 60 to 65. 
> 
> Thanks for reading this very, very strange thing that I've created. I know that the relationship between the boys remains an issue here, especially with how it will get mopped up in Chapter 28. There will be spillover, but I'm trying to make believable after the end of a relationship.


	24. Chapter 24

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo confronts Poe, but gets more than he bargained for. 
> 
> Read chapter notes for warnings!

 

It had taken the entire day to get Poe alone when Kylo finally spotted him in the hallway on Tuesday. A black eye swallowed up part of his face and he didn’t seem to care that everyone was staring at it, while also casting suspicious eyes in Kylo’s direction and then avoiding him when he finally caught his attention. Every time he started to approach him, he’d fled with his head down and shoulders tense. He hadn’t answered any of his texts all weekend. He hadn’t looked at him in class. So he skipped last period and sat outside of his locker, waiting. Any teacher that walked by, he’d just glare at them. Let them send him to fucking Holdo. Everyone could go to fucking hell and burn with Snoke for as much as he cared.

Finally, finally, he caught him. He couldn’t escape him now. He had to get into his locker.

“What’s wrong?” Kylo asked, standing instantly when he caught Poe’s eyes. It was the end of the day. Everyone was streaming around them, pretending not to look. Kylo rubbed his hand over his satchel, trying to calm himself down. He had prepared for the confrontation. He just had to stay focused and find out what had happened and why he was being ignored.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” The black eye looked even worse when Poe neared him to open his locker. It was half-swollen shut, redness tingeing his eyelid. “It’ll be fine, _Kylo_. I just need to be…alone. To think. Okay? You get to think all the time.”

Poe’s phone clattered to the floor out of his pocket and he swore, loudly, getting the attention of a group of seniors across from them on the steps to the music room. Their snickers stopped when he turned to glare at them. Kylo reached for the phone before Poe could grab it, instantly panicked by the broken screen.

“It’s okay. It was already busted. It still works. I just can’t…call anyone. Or text back. Look, it got fucking broken because I’m a fucking idiot. If that’s what you’re looking for,” Poe mumbled as he slipped on his jacket and winced. He grabbed his bag and turned to leave when Kylo reached to touch his shoulder.

He was filled with panic about who had hurt him. He wanted to know if it was anyone at school. If they had, they wouldn’t get away with it. He was going through the list in his head, staring off into Poe’s face when he saw him yelling at the seniors over his shoulder. He turned and scowled at them and only saw them laughing. Was it them? He wanted it be them and not be his father. He didn’t want this to be about what his parents had set in motion.

“I’ll take you home, come on,” he finally said. “Please.”

Poe’s face was flushed with anger, the same redness from the park blushed his cheeks. He looked from the others, then back to him, then up at the ceiling. “Whatever makes you happy.”

He was taller than Poe, but somehow the other boy was faster. He had to quicken his pace to keep up and reach the parking lot. The buses were still pulling out and the chaos of after school, which usually overwhelmed him, faded into nothing. They waited in silence; Kylo was both afraid to speak and waiting for Poe to tell him what was going on. He always did. Even though he was breathing deeply and searching for calm, there was still silence. Poe slowly put his head in his hands as the last school bus pulled away. He finally stood and took two steps down before his shoulders stiffened. There were still other cars there and Poe hesitated, standing at the front entrance to the school as he eyed the boys from before.

Sitting down with all his meagre weight on the front step, Poe gripped his backpack. “Can we just wait here? Until they go. Unless you have anything to say to them? Or me?”

The question only increased his anxiety. They must have been the ones. He looked up at glared at them, telling them with his eyes that they’d understand how black eyes felt the next day. Glancing at the license plates as they drove away, trailing after the distant school buses, he put them into his mind for the next morning.

“Guess we’re waiting here all night.”

They were almost alone by the time Poe spoke. Kylo had been intently watching him, waiting for an answer. He could get him a new phone. His parents would do anything for him and he would just ask them to take money from the stupid victim’s fund. They also liked Poe and thought it was good that they were friends. He could make everything right. He had to. This was his friend.

He reached for Poe’s hand and he pulled away, stalking off for Kylo’s car.

“You want to go home? Then let’s just go home!” Poe shouted. “Go back to your fucking perfect home!” He grabbed at the car door and swore when it was still locked. Kylo hit the button on the key fob and Poe, his face still angrier than he’d ever seen before, got inside.

“Please, tell me what happened? I think I know but…” Kylo started, leaning towards the passenger seat and trying to reach for him.

Poe just looked at his hands after pulling away.

He didn’t want to start the car without knowing who had hurt him. But his silence did not give him any answers. Instead, Poe turned to glare at him and left the car.

He scrambled after Poe as he stomped away, back towards the building. The parking lot was nearly empty, taking on a foreignness he wasn’t accustomed to.

He called out but Poe didn’t stop. His shoulders were stiff as he went straight towards the gym with determined feet.

Finally catching up in the boy’s locker room, Kylo tried to touch him as he stepped by him. The neon lights buzzed to life and hissed at him from the ceiling. Poe’s gaze was equally cold. He slammed the door to the empty locker room shut and turned, his face flushed red with dawning tears. The sickly green-black skin that framed his eye glistened. Looking at the bruise, Kylo knew where to place his anger, but he couldn’t back down from the conflict. He just needed an answer.

But it was Poe who spat out a question instead. “What’s your problem?”

Raising his head, Kylo set his shoulders straight at the other boy, glaring down at him. Nothing had brought this on, other than asking about where he’d been and who’d hit him. Revenge was something easy for Kylo to crave and he needed to know who to direct that passion towards. Whatever the others had said had just bled through his mind, mixing into lies and rumours. He really wanted to ask Poe the same question but his mouth was numb. He stood where he was, watching Poe stalk across the room.

“Come on, answer me!” He slammed his hand down on the bench.

“I really don’t understand,” he answered. “Tell me what’s wrong. Why can’t we just go home?”

“What’s wrong? What’s wrong?! I mean come on! You didn’t even stand up to them just now. What’s happened to you?” Poe’s face reddened further as he spoke, drawing to a bright crimson. His shouts filled the room, echoing against the tiled walls. The lonely drip from the shower was finally overtaken by the yelling.

Blinking, he shook his head. “I didn’t really hear…”

“Because you didn’t want to hear! God!” He threw up his hands and groaned before sitting down heavily on the bench. He wiped at his eyes, tears starting to spill down his cheeks. "The last few days have been hell for me and you're just making excuses."

Unsure of how to move or feel, Kylo tried to reach out to touch Poe’s t-shirt. Touching helped. If he could hug him then he’d tell him what was wrong. His hand was swatted away and he was met with a dark glare. He silently withdrew his hand—his awkward hand—and took a long step back, settling against the lockers.

“Tell me what to do,” Kylo managed to say. “Please. Who hit you.”

“My fucking dad did, you asshole. You know that, don’t play dumb. You fucking knew that yesterday when I wasn’t here. Do you know where I was? Hiding in the bathroom because he was going to fucking end me and I had nowhere to go. First, you get your parents to call the cops and mess up my life even more. Then my dad stops giving a shit about that because I’m just a worthless little queer. He broke my phone and beat the shit out of me and called me a fucking faggot and now, now I get the same shit at school and you don’t even say anything. You won’t tell Rey, you won’t tell your parents, and I have to be so careful around you and them and now my life is even worse and you…you…” The younger teenager’s face was firm for a second and then melted into a sob. “I just want a boyfriend who _realizes_ that he’s boyfriend! If I get the crap kicked out of me because I love someone, I just want him to admit that he loves me back! Or at least acknowledges that he’s dating me.”

The shout sucked the air out of the empty room. There was a brief meeting of eyes before Poe turned quickly fled. The flimsy door clicked shut and Kylo was alone.

Shifting dumbly from foot to foot, Kylo could only sit down and blink through his blurred vision. When he finally touched his face, he realized that tears were falling from his own eyes too. A boyfriend. A boyfriend? None of it made sense. They were just friends that made each other feel good, taking off the edge and ... he loved him? The picture behind Poe’s broken phone screen flashed in his eyes and he could only stare at the empty background picture of his phone. He’d taken it out of his pocket to call Poe, to get him to come back. But even then, he didn’t know what to say.

As the lie he had been telling himself the last few months melted away into the dingy locker room, he heard the door open again. He quickly stood, ready to pull Poe into his arms and apologize, ready to try something or anything to not lose him.

Instead, Hux emerged from the darkened hallway.

Kylo froze, his mouth sagging open.

“I, um, heard everything.” His former friend said. “What just happened?”

The corners of Kylo’s eyes blurred red and then blackness darkened his vision until all he could focus on was Hux’s face. He was just making things normal between them again. The small waves and secret texts, and the fact that he might be moving back with his mom meant they could have been friends again.

Not after this.

Not if he had heard all of that.

The awkward tension of the locker room twisted in his chest. They had stood there, frozen for seconds that felt like endless and tormenting hours. Until Hux quickly turned and locked the door to the room. Kylo stood his ground, preparing for the beating that was clearly coming.

He lunged at Hux first, when he stepped out of the hallway but instead of hitting him, Hux just shook his head and pushed him away, spitting out a rapid apology.

“Kylo, Kylo, it’s okay. I’m not…I’m not going to hit you or anything. It’s okay. It’s really okay.” Hux shook his head, putting up his hands to stop him from getting closer again.

His eyes still locked on the other boy, Kylo blinked in shock. “What’s okay?”

“That you’re…that you and Poe are…whatever. Together.” Hux looked at his feet for a brief second, struggling with the phrase. “Everyone else might give you shit, but I won’t. Look, I came here to talk to you about what we talked about the other day. I didn’t mean to spy on you. I had to stay late and didn’t realize you were still here until I saw you guys run in and then he…I was about to come in when I heard all of the shouting. I’m really sorry, if that means anything.”

Kylo sat down hard on the bench, still trying to settle his breathing. “I can’t even begin to tell you. I can’t tell anyone.”

He always clung to those words. They were safe. They couldn’t hurt anyone but himself.

Weakly, he fumbled for his satchel. He pulled out the notebook where he’d written careful details about his feelings for Poe. Most of them only felt right on paper, but were things he could never put into open, real words. He lifted it up, offering it to Hux. The other boy nodded, took the book, and opened it to the first page. Flipping through the neat lines of writing, his eyes widened at parts, and then he grinned lightly at others. He didn’t read it all, Kylo could tell, but his hand slowed on one of the last entries. Kylo’s ears burned hot with embarrassment as Hux closed the book and gave it back to him.

“Um, wow.”

“Yeah.”

“Wow, um,” Hux paused, turning from the lockers to meet his eyes. “If you can write all that down, why can’t you tell him?”

Kylo let his head drop down. “Maybe if I tell him, it will be real. And I’ll end up hurting him, because I mess everything up. I've hurt him so much already and my dumb feelings will just make it worse. My parents called the cops because of me. His dad kicked the shit out of him because of me. He, I…we took a picture together. He had it on his phone. I guess he saw it.”

“You don’t want to lose him?”

“I didn’t want to lose you either,” Kylo’s voice was bitter as he spoke. “And I still did.”

“Not…not now. Not anymore.” Hux said, firmly. “I’m done with my dad pushing me around. I’ve been talking with my mom. We’ve, um, cried a lot. About me coming home. But that’s not the point. Maybe…maybe we should just go home so we can talk. You’re not okay right now.”

They quietly left the empty gym, catching glares from the custodians outside in the hallway. He heard the voices of other students staying late and felt a pang in his chest, wondering if Poe was with them. The bus stop wasn’t far, but it was still far enough to make him worry. Hux guided him outside, shaking his head. When they got to his car and Kylo spotted Poe’s backpack, resting in the backseat, new tears singed his eyes.

But the bud of revenge blossomed in his chest as he looked up and met Hux’s eyes. “His father can’t do that to him and get away with it. And the cops aren’t doing anything. Get in.”

Hux was shaking his head the entire time, but still got in the car. He scrambled to do up his seatbelt as Kylo was already pulling away from the school.

“Kylo, no. You can’t just go beat the shit out of his dad. The cops will stop you. Someone always calls the cops.” Hux looked terrified as Kylo pushed the speed in his car. The words were being spoken, but he didn’t feel their meaning. Nothing meant anything anymore; Poe couldn’t love him. It was the stupidest thing he could do.

“The cops forgot about me for seven years too,” he spat back. Anger settled around him, bringing him comfort. “And I want to kill him. I’ve done it before, and now I’m even stronger. I can kill him with my bare hands.”

Hux didn’t have a reply. He just locked his eyes forward and fingered the seatbelt.

“And then what?” Came the delayed response.

“Then we…” he quickly went back to the plan that he always clung to. “We get Poe and Rey and leave town. Fuck this place. Our parents aren’t even helping us anymore. We’ll be better off alone.”

“I want to believe you.” Hux had forced his voice to be calm but Kylo could see his hands shaking. His own hands would have been too if they weren’t gripping the steering wheel.

For all of Kylo’s devices and bravado, the second he parked outside of Poe’s house, it was only fear and panic that filled his mind. Stepping out of the car, Poe’s bag in his hand, he gave Hux one last look. It was the same one that they had shared in childhood—one that told both of them that they had to have one another’s backs. Together, they strode up the walkway.

The car’s engine had already drawn attention and the door flew open. Kylo paused in his step as an infuriated man set his eyes on him. Meeting the gaze, Kylo lifted the backpack.

“My _boyfriend_ forgot this in my car.”

“You little shit, I knew it was your fucking family. You get the fuck out of here.” Mr Dameron stood on the front step, blocking Kylo’s line of sight into the house.

“Make me.” Kylo’s voice dropped and he sized up the portly man before him. He wasn’t hardened and gnarly like Snoke. The twisted hands of that vicious man didn’t sit in the weak arms he was looking at now. But he didn’t claw his way through hell to watch someone else get hurt because of him. “Or can you only beat up fifteen year olds?”

The older man sneered and snatched something out of the front room before he stepped out of the doorway, taking the two steps down to the lawn. Kylo rolled his eyes at the baseball bat. He took a brief look at Hux, pretending to lower his guard.

That was all it took. Mr Dameron came at him, the bat raised, and he easily ducked away. Swinging his elbow, he connected with the back of the man’s head. Stumbling, Dameron came at him again. This time he smashed hard against his arm. But there was no pain, not with how his blood was flowing. He lashed out, hitting him with his opposite hand, directly under his attacker’s chin. The blow landed, the other man stumbled. And Kylo tackled him to the ground.

No one could understand that fighting brought him peace, a peace he desperately wanted to find elsewhere. Landing punches on the man’s face and chest, he felt a familiar calm take hold of his heart. The other man was still struggling, clawing at him and trying to press on his wounded arm. Screaming, he thrust forward, aiming to get his hands around the man’s neck. A dull tingling started to pass through his left hand and he couldn’t get a grip. Snoke’s face filled his vision, calling him a failure, and he paused in horror.

Arms were grabbing at him.

Two pairs of arms.

He weakly let them pull him off, staggering a few steps away from the groaning man on the ground.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Poe’s voice was in his ear. He couldn’t answer. He could only shake his head and dash towards his car, their way out.

Two slamming car doors followed his.

But his hands were shaking too much to turn the key.

He desperately looked over at Hux. His face was frozen in shock but he still nodded and Kylo struggled into the backseat. Once Hux slid into the driver’s side, the car started and they pulled away, into the tones of sunset shifting into evening.

“Fuck, Kylo, just…fuck.” Despite what Poe was saying, he was still stroking his hair. Kylo still couldn’t speak.

Tattered gasps left his mouth and he could only look up at him. “I love you.”

Poe, his face wet with tears, only frowned. “Funny way of showing it.”

“Hey, um, guys, where am I going?” Hux asked, looking back for a moment. “Kylo, I just have my learners. I can’t drive like you. I shouldn’t even be driving at night.”

Sitting up, he finally felt the sharp and burning pain in his arm. Cradling it against his chest, he took a long breath. “My house.”

“Why there?” Poe asked. “The cops are going to be coming after us. Fuck, Kylo. That was some brave shit but it was so fucking stupid.”

“We’re getting Rey and we’re going…wherever.” He kept his eyes forward, feeling a slight sting in one start to spread across his forehead. Shaking it off, he gave Poe a quick look before climbing into the front seat again. He snapped his seatbelt on and nodded to himself. “He should have never fucked with you. He shouldn’t have been fucking with you the entire time. And fuck the cops for doing nothing.”

Finally, finally, his house came into view. Hux wasn’t driving like his life depended on it.

“Get back in your seat. You drive like shit.” Shrugging on his jacket, placing his arm under one sleeve, he took off before the car had rolled to a stop.

Rey was sitting on the sofa, colouring. She was humming to herself when he slammed the front door open.

They rarely used the front door.

She’d know what it meant. She had to.

He took one look at her and she reacted without hesitation. Snatching up her shoes by the door, she followed him out of the house in a mad dash. Hopping into the driver’s seat, he waited only until her door was closed.

This was all of the plan that he had.

He’d have to make up the rest of it as they drove.

“What happened, Kylo?” Rey asked, doing up her seatbelt. She was frowning, but still focused on him. “Are we finally leaving?”

“This is so fucked.” Hux let out a long and defeated sigh. “This is so _fucked_.”

“Kylo, did you hurt someone?” Rey asked. Her voice wasn’t panicked, but she needed to know what was happening.

“Yeah, I did. Now we need to figure out what to do.” He felt relief as they left his neighbourhood. It wasn’t that far to the highway. He’d never driven that far before, but he knew every turn and corner to leave their shitty city and get anywhere.

“Was it your dad?” Rey had turned her questions to Poe.

“Yeah, sweet pea. He…Kylo did what he thought had to be done. I’m not that mad anymore, but the police are going to be pissed.”

He heard Rey sigh again and then she reached out her hand. “Can I have Kylo’s phone?”

Hux had to reach over and pull it out of his pocket. Kylo grimaced as he shifted, his arm only resting on the steering wheel. He had no strength in it. It was broken; he knew that feeling.

Rey unlocked his phone and was dialling a familiar number before he could protest. His attention was more on the road than the hot breathing in the car.

“Hi Agent Jinn, it’s Rey,” she paused. “We’re in trouble.”

There was a very long break before Rey spoke again.

“Okay. He can’t talk right now. We’re driving.”

He could hear both Hux and Poe suck in breaths, waiting to hear what the FBI agent was about to say.

“He says pull over and tell him what’s happening.” Rey repeated the words. “Pull over right now.”

As quickly as he could, with one working arm, he found an empty shoulder of the road and pulled off. The car settled to a stop, but his heart kept racing.

“He said whatever you did, he’s not mad and will try to fix it,” Rey said, firmly. “As long as you didn’t kill anyone.”

“He wanted to,” Hux mumbled. “What if we get stopped before anyone can help us? Fuck, just let me out. My dad is…”

“No one is leaving the car!” He shouted. “Give me the phone.”

“Kylo, what happened?” Agent Jinn’s voice was intense, but he could still hear the edges of sleep in it. He was also moving around. “I need you to tell me everything.”

“Why did you think I killed someone?” He asked, his voice breaking as he spoke.

Jinn sighed. “I’m good at my job. You and Rey were in a car. You were in trouble, but you never run from a problem that you can solve. There were others in the car. Kylo, tell me what happened. Follow the steps. Trace the events.”

He jerked his arm and felt a jolt of pain; it was spreading, deepening as it latched on to him. Groaning, he shifted and bit back tears. “My…” the temptation to say _friend_ lingered, but he pushed it down, “my boyfriend’s father hit him. Because my parents called the police about him but they didn’t do anything. When I asked him about it at school, other people saw us and started calling us names, I guess. I was just focused on him and he got angry. It was all my fault. I couldn’t get out of my head. I couldn’t hurt them, but I could hurt _him_. We went to his house and he saw me and came at me. I hit him. I hurt him. And then I ran away.”

There was a long sigh on the other end of the phone. “And you didn’t think to tell the cops that another boy had been hurt? Let them talk to the father?”

“We already did and they didn’t _do_ anything. And if they did do anything, it wouldn’t have been like we wanted. The cops don’t care. Just like they didn’t care about us. The FBI is better than the police.” The more he rested his arm, the more it burned. He tried to move it and it only made him suck in a pained breath. “You would have stopped him, but you’re not here.”

Another long pause. “Kylo, are you hurt?”

“He broke my arm,” he answered, the familiar sting burning up his shoulder still. “Agent Jinn, I wanted to kill him. What’s wrong with me?”

“Listen to me, okay? And don’t interrupt me or go into your own head. Be here, with me and listen. Kylo, for every year of trauma, you have more than a year of recovery. The severity of trauma that you and Rey endured will take more than that average. It’s only been two years. Other than talking to me, you’ve been avoiding real therapy, real _talk_. Your letters show progress and I can see it, but do others? Do you feel yourself getting better?” The words went straight at his heart and Kylo could only shake his head.

Glancing back at Poe and Rey, and then turning to Hux, he managed a light nod. “Tonight has been the first time in a long time that I wanted to hurt someone. I don’t…it’s gotten easier not to hurt myself. Agent Jinn, I fucked up.”

“Take a deep breath now. If you’re hurt, you need to call your parents. They need to come and get you and take you to the hospital. I…I can’t come to you. You know I would if I was there. I never wanted you to take all this on when you feel so alone.” Jinn’s voice dropped and he heard him sit down. He heard another voice in the background, asking what was happening. “If this is the same boy that you’ve been writing to me about, I’m guessing he decided to lie or you made him lie. Lies don’t help anyone, Kylo.”

“I know and I’m not alone. I…But I hurt someone.” His mouth could hardly make the words anymore. He was tired and the pain from his arm made him realize that he couldn’t drive anymore. “What will happen?”

“Did your friend see the other man try to hit you?”

“Yes.” _Did he?_

“I can’t step in here. I can’t do much more than tell you to tell the truth now. And if something like this happens again, remember the consequences of revenge and lying to get what you want. Our world is filled with evil, Kylo. I’m trying to stop it from spreading but you see it in the faces of anyone who hurts or threatens others, even if it isn’t obvious to others. You can’t touch darkness and forget how it feels, what it tastes like. Remember what we talked about: you can’t go there and not end up hurting yourself or others. If you want to work with me, to stop these awful people, you can’t do things like this. Now, please, call your parents. And make sure everyone in the car knows that they have to tell the truth to the police. No more plans. And no lies,” Jinn said. Every word should have made him want to argue, but the promise of being as kind and intelligent as the other man made him agree with him.

“I will. I promise. I’m sorry for waking you up with this…bullshit.” He rested his head against the steering wheel and sighed into the phone. Too many thoughts were fighting for a place in his head. He had to get out of the car. He couldn’t breathe.

“It’s not bullshit. Text me when you can. I’ll answer you.”

“Bye.” Kylo said shortly and then ended the call. He let the phone drop onto his lap and left his head against the wheel, taking slow and even breaths. Rey had been in the car. She’d heard everything that he said. He didn’t care about the police anymore. He wanted to figure out what to say to her.

The silence came on quickly, but was broken when Poe leaned forward to extend his hand to Hux.

“Hey, you know who I am and I know who you are, but I wanted to thank you for backing him up.” Poe was eyeing Kylo as he spoke, but he just kept his head down, only catching the look from under his arm.

“I didn’t have a choice, but I still wanted to be there,” Hux answered. “What your dad did to you…I’ve been there too.”

Poe leaned back and the leather of his jacket creaked. “Kylo told me. If we get out of this, we can compare notes. See whose dad sucks more.”

“I don’t have a dad,” Rey piped up. “Snoke murdered him, I think.”

If he could reach back into the car, he would have hugged Rey. Instead, his phone buzzed to life. _Leia_.

He fumbled with the phone and finally answered. “Hey.”

“Where are you? Ben, the police are looking for you. What did you do? Where’s Rey? I don’t want to be mad but I’m…Where are you?”

Her words echoed into a dull void. His head was feeling lighter with every second that he sat there. Was she really talking to him? Was she in the car? He didn’t know anymore. Everything was blurring into everything else, a never-ending, overlapping series of shapes.

He glanced up, looking for a sign. He couldn’t find one. Beside him, Hux had the place where they were parked up on his phone. Hux was talking, but he couldn’t hear him. Even when he told his mother where they were, he didn’t hear his own voice. He couldn’t be there anymore; he was gone. He couldn’t breathe in that car; he didn’t think that his lungs would ever work again. Somehow, he ended the call. His head sagged back and he screamed, but he couldn’t hear it. Finally finding whatever strength he had left, he tossed himself out of the car and onto the pavement and stalked off, still shrieking at himself and what he had let happen.

 

-=-

 

The door slammed shut and Rey let the words that Kylo had said grow in her mind as his shouts finally stopped. As his pained cries died in her ears, what he had said before expanded into larger and larger bubbles of anxious questions. She already knew the answers, but the amount of lying that had been going on made her heart hurt. He had sounded so broken, so hurt, but her head was being selfish in that moment. Her stomach ached at the thought. Turning to Poe, she quirked her head, hoping to feel something else. He gave her a careful, tight smile until she finally smiled back. It broke the stream of emotions coursing through her into a tighter stream. She had to stop and put things into pieces that she could sort through. There was another story here and she needed to figure it out. Poe’s bruised face was suddenly cast into darkness as the dome light went out. He had been hurt; she shouldn’t be mad at him. He shouldn’t have had to lie for Kylo.

But how could she hate Kylo?

It was Hux who finally ended the silence. He tapped the dashboard and sighed. She heard his jacket crinkle as he folded his arms. “Should we go after him?”

Poe shook his head and said exactly what she wanted to say. “He wants us to. But he also needs to get it all out, you know? There’s nothing else out here but a field, look. He’ll be back once he…once he hates himself enough. It tears me up inside when he does it. No one should feel like he does all the time. I shouldn't have said all the things that I said to him but I didn't think that he'd do something like this.”

Hux sighed. “I just wanted to tell him I was moving back home. I…yeah, I hate myself too. For ditching him.”

Kylo talked a lot about hate. It was always wrapped up in how others treated him and dealt with everyone around them. He would talk about love only on the good days, but there had been more of them the last three months. To him, there wasn’t enough love in the world to balance the hate. That’s why she had to do nothing but love and not be like him and only hate. She wanted to keep the promise that she had made to him, but wished that he could keep the same one to her. Rey unclicked her seatbelt and moved easily to sit next to Poe in the cooling car. She forgot her jacket and she needed someone to hold. He dropped his arm around her shoulder and she felt safe enough to speak.

“We missed you. Kylo wrote you a letter but he wouldn’t send it,” she kept her voice strong as Poe stroked her hair. But she had seen him wince as she put her head against him. No wonder Kylo was so angry. But he could have found another way. That’s what he was supposed to do. But Hux needed her now. Kylo was busy hating himself. “I told him to and he said he did. He lies when he’s afraid.”

Hux sat up and straightened his shoulders. Kylo always did that when he was realizing something, both good and bad. “I wrote and deleted so many texts to him. My dad kept telling me that he was a pervert or a psycho. He has pages in that stupid book highlighted and I see him look up Kylo all the time online. He wanted me to tell him everything that I knew about him and I did at first but then it just felt wrong. He’d make me comment on this one blog about what I knew. It felt good at first. Like, when I thought he stole Liza from me. I put so much shit out there that he shouldn’t forgive me for, no matter how much I want him to. I just wanted my dad to love me again. I was stupid to lose my best friend. So fucking stupid.”

“You never lost him.” Poe leaned forward, shifting Rey slightly, to put his hand on Hux’s shoulder. “He liked working with you on the project, believe it or not. We talked about you a bunch. I was kind of jealous.”

Hux looked at him with heavy eyes. “I guess I missed a bunch of stuff.”

“Yeah, you did.”

Rey tried to keep quiet as Poe sat back. The questions wanted to burst out of her chest, but she kept her mouth shut. The car was off and cold so she leaned closer to Poe. When he was gone, she’d missed him, really. It had been strange not to see him as much lately. It was frustrating being so small; time never made sense and she didn’t know how long he’d been gone for. Ahsoka talked about how friends brought out good things and bad things in people. Despite her anger at him from before, despite how much it sucked to have to talk about feelings all of the time, she did get a new friend. And Kylo wasn’t as soft as he used to be to cuddle with. His arms would sometimes hold her too tight. But Poe was soft and she liked his laugh; she felt awful for being angry at him for something that was Kylo’s fault. But what Kylo hadn’t told her was starting to scratch the walls of her mind until they were bloody. Their bond could never be broken, but he had made tiny steps away from her. At first, she was happy that he was feeling better and that their time apart meant they could live without breathing the same air all of the time. Maz always told her that they’d be in each other’s lives forever, but that would also mean time spent being separated. Kylo would go to college one day. She had to be ready. But the little lies, those she couldn’t understand. And now it was the biggest lie ever. She shivered and Poe hugged her closer, but she felt his hands start to bunch against her.

“We’re a bunch of fugitives,” Poe finally said and Rey rolled her eyes with his nervous talking, burrowing her head in his lap. At least he still smelled like Kylo. “Is this…kidnapping? Did you guys kidnap me and her?”

“I don’t think it’s kidnapping,” Hux answered, shaking his head. He caught Rey’s eyes and smirked. It was so dark and all she could see were the pale whites of his eyes. He looked so much older now. They were all growing up, getting away from her. “We didn’t get that far. Hopefully Kylo’s parents get here before the cops. Maybe no one saw the plates.”

“Everybody heard Ky screaming. Somebody saw it. I got off the bus and I heard it and ran all the way home. Everyone’s lights were on.” Poe shifted and pulled her up, against his chest. He knew that she was cold and shifted off his jacket, draping it over her and then pulling her close again.

Kylo was still not coming back. Rey shifted, her unease making it hard to sit and wait. She hugged Poe’s coat closer and tried to decide if she wanted Kylo to come back or not.

“Isn’t your dad a lawyer? Do you think I’ll get deported?”

Hux sat up and looked into the back of the darkened car. “Why would you get deported? Weren’t you born here?”

Poe nodded. Rey just closed her eyes.

“And were your parents born here?”

Again, Poe nodded. She felt him moving and let her head slump against him.

“So?”

“But my grandparents came here. It was legally, but now they live in Mexico. If the police come, they’ll put me into one of those camps on the news. Won’t they? Hey, call your dad. Ask him if I’m going to get deported.” Poe’s mouth wouldn’t stop. Rey rested her head on his lap as she shifted down again and let her mind try to untangle everything that was happening.

Hux was arguing that his dad was just a corporate lawyer and he _fucking_ hated him so why would he call him to ask such a stupid question. Both of them were avoiding thinking about what Kylo was doing. Staying in the car was getting harder and harder.

“There’s a car coming,” she said, hearing the distant rumbling of tires.

“Fuck,” Hux’s voice was filled with panic as he sat up and looked in the rear-view mirror. Forcing herself up, Rey looked out the back window.

A familiar pair of headlights pulled up beside them.

Rey lurched away from Poe and opened the door. “Dad!”

Han stepped out of his car and looked from the empty driver’s seat to her. “Hey, baby girl. Where is he?”

She could hear Kylo’s footsteps before he emerged into the light from the car. He was dirty and bleeding. The light washed out his black clothes, shifting them into grey. But she could see where they were ripped and torn. Rey clenched her hand around dad’s coat, not wanting to run to him. His eyes told her not to and the anger that spread in her chest made it easier to listen to him.

Leia stepped out of the passenger side of the car and reached for her son. With slow and heavy steps, he leaned into her arms. Rey finally broke from where she stood and wrapped her arms around both of them. She wasn’t supposed to be angry; it just made it harder to love. Kylo’s hand fell on her shoulder and he squeezed it hard.

“What happened?” Leia asked, gasping. “Where were you going?”

Kylo just bit his lip and stepped away, shaking his head. He took Rey with him and she willingly followed. She heard the other boys step out of the car. But other than that, everything was quiet. Even the humming of the engine couldn’t take over the silence that filled her ears.

 

-=-

 

They were three exhausted kids, jammed into the back of Kylo’s car, headed back into town. Hux was in his father’s car, probably telling him everything that had happened, pausing and _umming_ every other sentence. Off the highway, he had told them all everything again, adding in Agent Jinn’s warnings. His parents looked stone faced at the story, but he saw his father wince when he was describing how he beat Poe’s father for him. He knew that his father was calling the police as they drove to the hospital. Despite his mind being in the other car, his heart was in his: the two people nestled against him were his world and he had denied one of them for three months full access, while the other he’d hurt almost beyond the point of forgiveness. Still, his mother was grumbling over her phone’s GPS. She couldn’t even look into the rear-view mirror to meet his eyes. Rey was tucked beside him. He was in the middle, too stubborn to sit anywhere else.

Poe leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. “Did you mean it?”

“Mean what?” He asked, squinting through his tiredness.

Poe’s eyes shone. And he nodded.

With Rey snoozing on his lap, her hand in an angry first, Poe rested against his good shoulder.

The next time he tried something like this, he’d have a better plan.

 

-=-

 

Rey listened to the police speak with Kylo from her spot on the sofa. They all got to miss school and it was really weird. She pretended to be colouring, but really she was trying to figure out if he was in real trouble or not. Part of her wanted him to be and it made it hard to hold her pens. It was easier to focus on him that the storm of questions in her mind. After she paused for a few moments, her pen hanging above the paper, Hux tapped the page.

“He’ll tell us. Don’t worry.”

The hospital had made her ache and she only had boys to talk to. They had fixed Kylo’s arm and Poe had hugged her as they waited. Someone asked about his bruises and he had only shook his head and laughed it off. When they took him away, she saw the first uniform. And then there were more and more. Kylo wouldn’t lie; he couldn’t lie this time. The police were there. Agent Jinn had told him not to lie. But he was getting better at lying and it made it hard to breathe.

She only realized that she’d forgotten her shoes in the car when they got home at 2 a.m. She didn’t understand why Hux and Poe were still with them but was too tired to ask. And the only person that she wanted to ask had sat in silence since the hospital.

But she still couldn’t sleep. She had heard Leia and Han arguing as all four of them slept in Kylo’s room that night. Hux had looked confused as he sat on a sleeping bag on the floor at the three of them in the bed. Kylo didn’t say anything. He pulled her close and she knew that he didn’t sleep that night.

Nobody left that night. Nobody took them all away. She just kept imagining a group of adults, storming the house, and taking everyone away and she’d be left alone in an empty house. She knew where the food was, but if no one had left her money, she couldn’t do it alone. Maybe they’d take Rose and Finn too, since they were her friends and didn’t know the truth either. Everyone was going to be gone again and she wouldn’t have Kylo to protect her.

But the police arrived during breakfast. She kept expecting Hux to leave because that’s what he did, he ran away.

But he was still there. And so was Poe. He was asleep across the living room in Han’s chair, Lumpy licking at his hand. He’d been quiet, avoiding everyone’s eyes all morning. The jokes were gone as reality seemed to set in. She’d heard him talking to his mom early that morning and he was crying. No one else was awake. She’d felt him leave the bed early to sleep on the couch. She thought he’d be cold too and had followed and ended up sleeping next to him under the warm quilt. He still got up before her, and was trying to talk quietly in the corner. She sat up and looked at him and his shoulders just looked limp. He told her that he didn’t know what was happening. But he couldn’t go home. He cried more and Rey held his hand. Nothing made sense. No one was telling her anything. Was she really this small?

“Has anyone asked you how you feel about this?” Hux whispered, settling down on the floor beside the couch. “He and him.”

Rey put her pen down and tried to sort out her thoughts about it. The last few months had been good; Kylo had been really happy, despite his deception. She’d laughed with Poe and liked having two people around her so much of the time who liked her and liked one another. When she had figured out her own heart and where to put it, she realized where her place was and that jealousy was worse than hate. Ahsoka and Maz had talked about being envious about what other kids had, or jealous about other things. She wanted Kylo to be happy and not stop loving her. The more that she thought about it, when she couldn’t sleep that night because Kylo’s breathing was too strange, she decided that this would have to be like everything else. She had to be stronger than Kylo. She figured it out without anyone telling her. She could love mom and dad and still think about her real parents, the dead ones; Kylo had to learn how to share his heart too. She sucked on her bottom lip and looked at Hux.

“I saw them kiss a long time ago. Kylo didn’t notice. Kylo…he can like boys. But I’m the only girl he loves.” She returned to her colouring, determined to fill in the final corner. It wasn’t perfect yet. She hated wasting any inch of a book. Every part needed to be filled. She noticed Hux watching her and he picked up a pen. He started working on the still unfilled border and she smiled at him. “He missed you too.”

“I know he did. It was shitty, what I did.”

Rey kept colouring, forcing the pen closer to the page. “It’s your dad’s fault. Just like Poe’s dad. Maybe my real dad would have hit me too.”

Hux set his pen down and hugged her. She leaned against his arm and snuggled against his shirt. She had missed the way that he smelled. It was different from the other boys and even dad. She could share Kylo with Hux and Poe. Those things felt right. The love that Kylo had for her wouldn’t be broken by them, by stupid boys. Tucked into the safety of Hux’s arms, she let her mind drift into the dark place, the place that her therapists told her not to go to unless she felt safe. She had to figure it out and cut it up, into small pieces, and organize in her own head. Like colouring in the last corner of a picture, everything had to make sense.

In her imagination, she thought about what would have happened if these other two boys, ones that Kylo also loved, had been there. They would have fought so hard, together. She had been too small too fight, even though she wanted to. The other boys had been too afraid. Hux and Poe weren’t afraid.

She didn’t want to cry. Blinking hard, she pushed closer to Hux.

“I wish you’d been there.”

Hux sat up and quirked his head. “Where?”

“ _There_.”

“Oh.”

In the distance, the police kept talking. And Rey just wanted to go to sleep again.

 

-=-

 

The day finally ended with an empty dinner of delivery Chinese food. Kylo only ate to stop his head from feeling so clouded.

His parents had been there with him throughout all of the questioning. It had dragged on and on for hours. Eventually, the others took the dog for a walk and he had only been able to give them an empty look, hoping that they would come back. Some woman had sat with the two male cops, asking him questions, writing down everything that he said and asking him more and more intrusive things. She was just like the doctors and nurses from before: he didn’t care about her name or what she was doing there. He just told the truth this time, though. He had to listen to Agent Jinn. He was too tired to hide his tears and wept throughout most of the interviews. Why hadn’t they taken them all to the station? He was going to jail for this. He’d let his need take him in the wrong direction.

But then, after talking to the others, nothing happened.

_He’s not pressing charges._

His parents couldn’t look at him as he moved his food around his plate, staring at it blankly. Poe nudged him and he finally picked up another piece of beef and ate it. It tasted like nothing.

“There’s a lot we need to talk about. After this. _All_ of us. The schools have been calling all day and I didn’t have an answer for them so I want a real one soon.” Han looked around the table. Kylo would have laughed if he could have been outside of his body and seen the sad group of people around the table from the perspective of anyone just peaking in through the window.

Hux, who was afraid to go home and worried that he still had said something wrong to the police. His eyes were always darting around the table, wearing the discomfort on his face and by how he had shredded three napkins in his lap.

Rey, who wouldn’t let go of his hand and wouldn’t stop telling him that she loved him with her eyes, but had more to say to him later when he would have to talk. She had still managed to eat all of the eggrolls in between her decided glares.

Leia had a glass of wine in her hand and her hair was long and unbraided; it had been all day and last night. But her face was emotionless, like it had been as he had sat with the police. He still remembered the smell of her hair as it filled his nose when he had embraced her last night. It smelt safe; it smelt like the home that he had been denying was truly his for too long. But her eyes were now empty and without feelings that he could understand under the cloud that filled his head. The only emotion that he could catch was when she actually looked at him and it made his head sink lower. The progress from the last few months was stalled in one flash of sadness.

Han, unlike his wife, wore his unwillingness to have the conversation, which he had just threatened, on his face. He had been his biggest defender in the meeting, but his eyes too held the haunting look of betrayal. He had been the one to tell the police and the strange woman about how hard he’d been working the last two years. Now, Kylo didn’t believe those words. He’d made too many mistakes.

And Poe, whose big brown eyes revealed the dozens of things that he was thankful for but also hundreds of other things that were left unknown. His father was in the hospital, seething but afraid. The cops knew more than Poe had. Kylo had lurked close enough in the living room to overhear the interview before Rey had grabbed his hand to drag him away. His mother had left, staying with friends two hours away. They were getting away. But that meant Poe would have to go with her.

“I’ve had a lot of strange dinners, but this one…if my hair wasn’t already turning grey, you kids would ruin every hair on my head. You all missed school because of something I’m still trying to wrap my mind around. How do we even have this talk? You’re all so broken…” Han finally mumbled as he stood from the table. “You’re all just pretending to eat. Go sit in the living room, _now_.”

Except for him and his mother, everyone sat up and moved to stand. He weakly followed, drawn by Poe’s hand. Lumpy followed Rey as they all found places both far close enough to Han, but also close far away enough to get yelled at. Their plates were still sitting on the table. He could see Rey straining her head, wondering if she should gather them up or not. He shook his head no and she finally relaxed against him. The four of them were crammed onto the couch. Rey sat between him and Hux. Poe was pressed against his side; he wanted nothing more than to lean his head against him. No one had showered; everyone was so dirty. It should have made him disgusted, but the smell was comforting. He was used to panicking when everything sat like it did just then. His mother sat in the chair across from them, sipping the last of her wine and frowning. He turned away, looking first at Hux and Rey, and then Poe.

Couldn’t this just be over?

He heard his father move a chair from the kitchen to the living room. He set it down hard and sat down.

“Ben,” Han’s voice was loud and made all of them jolt up. “And I’m calling you that right now because that’s what would have been in the charges. The _fucking_ charges. All you talk about wanting to be in the FBI and then you do something like this. Because of…because of a boy. I never wanted to talk to you like this, to punish you. We avoided it. We avoid talking like this because that’s what everyone says is best but you always say how you hate the doctors. So, you know what, fuck the doctors. I’m sick of them too.”

He lifted his head and met his father’s angry eyes. He quickly looked away. Poe took his hand and squeezed it. He couldn’t go away into his head right then; but it was still tempting.

“I…” he started and then cleared his throat. “Do you think I should have gone to jail?”

Han exhaled, hard. He could almost feel the warm breath on his face. “I don’t know, son. It wouldn’t have helped you.”

He watched his father’s face break for a moment before he put his head down. It hurt too much to keep looking at him.

“Armitage,” Leia’s calm voice broke in. “You could have gone home hours ago. Let’s hear what you have to say. Your mother wants you to call her. She’s not mad that you skipped school to be here for Ben but she’s very, very worried.”

Hux sat up and nodded. His shoulders straightened and he was desperately trying to look serious. Kylo saw the echoes of his father in those motions and tried to push the images away. He was different now, or at least said that he was. Kylo still wasn’t sure if he’d proven himself last night or not. He wasn’t sure what he remembered or not. “I wanted to say I’m sorry to everyone. I’m really, really sorry. I should have made him not let Rey get into the car. When I was living with my dad, I wanted to think like him. I never meant to hurt anyone. Especially Kylo. And Rey. I went with him to Mr Dameron’s house because I had to have his back. I, we, stopped him from hurting him more.”

Hux’s nervous eyes swept the room. Meeting the look, Kylo finally nodded. With a reluctant sigh, he left the sofa and went into the other room. They waited, everyone pretending not to listen to the muffled call.

When he came back into the living room, Hux looked directly at Leia and his posture fell. “I can’t stay tonight again, can I?”

Leia stood and gently hugged the redhead. Kylo could hear his friend sob into his mother’s arms. She whispered something to him and he nodded before stepping away. After quickly pressing a kiss to Rey’s forehead, and resting a hand against his shoulder, he left. He went home, the house next door and not the one across town. Or at least that’s what Kylo chose to believe.

Now, it was only them.

Kylo deeply wanted his parents to send Rey to bed before what he knew what was coming.

Leia sat down on her chair again and looked down at his angel. “Are you tired, Rey?”

Rey shrugged. She was filled with food so she should be happy. But instead her eyes were avoiding his. “I…yes. But I want to be here.”

“Then you can be here,” Leia said.

Han just shook his head. “Boys. You can decide who talks first.”

Kylo was used to talking to police, but seeing the same look of determination from his father sent him rigid. He didn’t feel anything from the three other people around him. He could only see his father’s hazel eyes and swallowed his fear.

But no words came out when he tried to speak.

Poe spoke for him “We’ve been more than, um, road roommates for like three months. I think.”

“What does that mean?” His father’s voice was ice, daring Poe to lie to him. “We heard what he told the police. Now I want to hear how you see it.”

And Poe didn’t back down. “Mr Solo, I don’t want you not to like me anymore, if you ever liked me. This really all my fault, but please don’t hate me. I really, really appreciate you guys trying to help me and I’m sorry for lying to the cops before. I didn’t want to lose my mom and now I don’t know what to do. So please don’t hate me and keep helping me.”

He paused and looked at them pleadingly. His parents didn’t respond so Poe nodded to himself and kept talking.

“At first, I just thought I liked him because he needed a friend and I was lonely too. And it just, boom, hit me hard. The way he talks, the way he acts, the way he, um, looks. I…me and Kylo, we started talking about things that he didn’t want to tell anyone else. He still thinks he can’t tell anyone, but I know it’s just because he’s got a wall in his head that won’t come down. I like him. Me and Kylo, we just pick up on each other’s sadness. And we’re less sad when we’re together. My dad knew I was different and thought he could beat it out of me, like something like that could change a person.” Kylo needed to touch him; Poe’s voice was wavering and he could see his eyes start to shimmer. He took Poe’s hand and could feel his parents’ eyes burning at the sight. If he could speak to him like he did with Rey, he’d tell him that he could stop talking.

But he kept going. “We kiss and touch each other. There hasn’t been anything really serious, um, physically because I respect him and what he’s been through. He’s actually freaking out less when we…” he paused finally looking up, and then quickly down again. “Yeah, um, okay. Not going to talk about that. But it’s been getting better. And after what he’s been through, and what Rey has been through, it makes me feel like an asshole for fucking everything up. I kept telling him to tell you, but he was so scared. I really, really care about him. I’ve never had anything like this before and I love him. He thinks he’s all fucked up and until the last few days, I thought I was helping him. I wanted to tell you a month ago, but then everything happened with Rey and…I love Rey and…I love him. Please don’t make me go home right now. I don’t know where home is right now and I don’t know what to do.”

Han sat back and Kylo dropped his eyes. Poe’s hand firmed in his.

“Boys,” it was Leia who spoke up. “Before this happened, we knew you were close. And we knew that Ben was happy. But he needs stability. If things escalate like this again, we can’t let you two be together, mostly because Ben will always make Rey a part of it. But if you’re both serious, and you both can accept that we can’t let you ever put her in danger again, then we can be behind this. But this…relationship won’t be easy. You two know that.”

“We know that,” Kylo found his courage and said. “I wouldn’t have done what I did if I didn’t know that.”

He felt Leia leaning over to touch Rey, reminding him that she was still there and the horror in his mind was reawakened. “Sweetheart, do you understand what we’re saying?”

He held his breath and kept his eyes focused on the coffee table.

Rey huffed loudly and stood from the sofa. She looked at everyone in the room, narrowing her gaze on him. He only lifted his head for her.

She didn’t look betrayed. She just looked tired of all the talking. He winked at her and she nodded, but her expression didn’t change.

“I love you, mom and dad. But I love them too. They’re my family. Poe is my friend too and his father was a terrible person for hurting him. You’re not supposed to hurt kids. The police didn’t need to come after us, they should have gone after him. I was mad at Poe for a while, but now I’m not. I’m tired of mean people. I would follow Kylo anywhere to be with him and help him. But I can’t help him enough. It made me sad at first, but then I figured it out without anyone telling me. And I know what a boyfriend is. I’m not stupid. Can I go to bed now?” Rey swished her head from him to Han and Leia. They had the decency to look surprised before both of them nodded and she dashed off for his room. Lumpy followed, happily wagging his tail. She knew that the real conversation would come later.

His cast itched as he looked at his father again. “Can we go to bed too?”

“You’re not getting out of this that easy, son. Listen to me right now, okay? Both of you. You do not put that little girl in danger again. If you haven’t heard anything else that I’ve said tonight, then I don’t care.” Han paused and Poe’s hand tensed in his. “But you do not take her anywhere. Ben, you love her so much but you put her in danger. Why did you do that? You took her right back to what you got her out of, back into not knowing what was going on and being in danger. With a broken arm? Really? This is why I’m so angry right now. Just so you understand, both of you, don’t you ever do that again. The rest of it, I’m still trying to understand. I knew something was going on and just ignored it. But we’re here for you, don’t get me wrong. We love you, the both of you. But if you take her out of this house again and try to run…”

“I won’t do that,” Kylo forced himself to say. “I wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry, dad.”

Han sat back and folded his arms. “I know you weren’t. That’s what makes us afraid. We’ve all worked hard for almost two years to make this a home, a family. When you,” Han sucked in a long and reluctant breath, “Poe, came into all of this, some of the harder parts got easier. I guess we know why now. But we got to know so much more and he opened up. It’s just by a crack, but we’ll take it. And if you two want to be together…we can help that happen. Just keep Rey out of danger. Christ, I need a drink.”

His father left his chair, but stopped to lean against the kitchen island when his mother glared at him. Han met her sharp gaze and shook his head. Kylo looked into Poe’s eyes as they listened to his father pouring himself a glass of wine in the kitchen. Poe wanted to smile, he could see the way the corner of his good eye quirked, and Kylo shook his head not to. They couldn’t laugh right then.

Han finally returned, gruffly sitting down. “Give me a break. I had to sit with the police the entire day and then interrogate a bunch of traumatized teenage boys. Can you both stop smirking and respect me for one second here: do not take Rey from this house again.”

Their eyes turned in tandem to his father and nodded before dropping again. Poe moved closer to him and he accepted it. He just wanted to go to bed.

“We know,” Poe finally said. “He doesn’t want to talk right now but…we know. It was stupid. And I guess it’s stupid to say that it’s all my fault?”

“There’s no fault here anymore.” His mother didn’t look at them as she spoke. “We’re here for you. Both of you. But there’s another person here who you both have hurt. Rey is still a child, but if she can see these things and we can’t, then you need to tell her what you’re doing. She’s smart but she’ll be hurt by this, Ben. With the new therapist, this is even more important now. You know that. And just…” His mother leaned forward and pressed her hand to a point on her eyebrows. “We will talk about this in the morning. I can’t have the sex talk right now. Keep the door open tonight. Because even if we tell you not to sleep in the same room, you’ll just do it anyway.”

 

-=-

 

Rey was sitting on his bed, glaring at the door when they entered.

“You didn’t tell me. We don’t keep secrets from each other. Especially this long.”

Her calm from before had been swept into a whirlwind of anger, directed only at him. Kylo stood in the doorway, blinking an apology. Rey just rolled her eyes and flopped down on the bed, covering her face with her hands.

“Should I um, go sleep downstairs?” Poe asked, still behind him. “Have another awkward conversation with your parents as they plot how they want me to go die in a ditch?”

Rey sighed loudly from the bed. “I’m not mad at you this time. And I hate being mad at him. And I _hate_ hating.”

“Yeah, me too.” Poe nudged by him and sat on the bed. Rey shifted to put her head on his lap. Kylo stared at them from the doorway. What she had said before was still stuck in his ears. They’re her _family_. The last few months had meant keeping things from her. He’d been selfish. The other night, he’d made decisions that could have hurt far more people than just one. Driving with a fractured arm had been stupid. He hadn’t stopped to think, to breathe, and to look around at what was real.

He’d been feeling better. Poe hadn’t just taken him closer to normal. He almost had him there.

But he was letting Rey fall behind, caught up in…

…falling in love.

He wiped at his eyes, feeling tears break through his stubbornness.

He had spent three years, desperate for numbness and not to feel hope. Someone would come, someone he’d connect with: a boy with sandy hair or a girl with blue eyes, desperate to hold his hand and hear his voice in a world of chaos. At first, he’d fight to protect them. And then he’d be beaten and cursed at, thrown into a closet and starved for days. Then Snoke would pull him out, force him to listen to his words about why humanity was doomed and why anything that felt good would only be a temptation and not a resolution. He would write until his hands were numb and his eyes were dry. He was losing himself and what made him Ben. Then, he died. He was Kylo Ren. And then a baby was put in his arms and he needed to be something else too, not just an empty shell that helped a killer. Having Rey meant that there would be an end. Hers would be happy. His was just an end.

Now, after being in the real world for over two years, he wanted to have more than just darkness and the constant memory of death.

He still didn’t know how to balance the two.

He had realized that when he’d left the car and the three people who he cared about. He screamed and cried and bashed his broken arm against the ground, willing his body to feel more pain. Pain was something that would never leave him.

Poe and Rey were looking at him and he shifted from side to side.

There used to be nothing inside of him. There were only dark basements and bloody hands. Those were things that he didn’t want to remember but they were always lurking in the quiet moments when he smelt any distant tinge of burning flesh. He had hated the kitchen, the cafeteria…anywhere with food. It had been harder to avoid those places now. And he felt fine being there. He had missed how easy it had become just to eat.

But Rey hadn’t been with him at school. She hadn’t been there when Poe stole his fries until he was forced to eat them. She wasn’t there at the movie theatre. She’d been at home, waiting for him, for them.

“I’m sorry, Rey.”

His voice made them both frown and Rey shook her head. He had sounded too pathetic, too empty and weak.

_You could have told me because I already knew._

He held her eyes and felt new tears. He sucked in his cheeks and bit hard.

_He wanted me to tell you. I didn’t know what he meant. He also told me what I should have known._

Rey reached out her hand. “Come, please. I love you.”

His feet wouldn’t move. He wanted both of them.

Would he have saved Poe if he had been thrown in with them, when they were there? He would have been filled with back talk and constant energy. There wouldn’t have been a quiet moment to hold his hand. To let him hug him when he felt lost and empty. To feel his kiss when the void threatened to take him.

“Ky?” Poe asked, tilting his head and trying to distract him and bring him back to where he was supposed to be. “We’re not going anywhere, but we kind of want you to come sit with us.”

“How can I do both? How can I…” he started and then stopped. His legs were still heavy, preventing him from going to what he wanted most. “I don’t want to fuck this up again.”

Rey sat up, her large brown eyes cutting through him. She leaned her head against her shoulder. “Again?”

She knew how to frustrate him. She knew how to look at him to make him move. He finally took the few strides to the bed and sat beside her. With one of her small and soft hands, she reached for his. She still didn’t look at him with her usual joy; this was as far as punishment got with Rey. She loved him too much to be truly angry with him. At least this time, he thought with spite.

Then Rey reached for Poe’s hand and a small smile grew into a grin on her face when the three of them were sitting there, connected. In the back of his mind, it felt stupid. It felt embarrassing. Poe finally laughed and leaned into Rey.

“Thanks for forgiving us, Rey. I don’t understand why, but thanks.” Poe’s voice was light. He was only talking to Rey. “But, um, you sounded cool downstairs. Was that for show? Because I, we, have to know. Kylo and me…yeah, we're together in a different way. You figure things out quickly, but this is confusing for even…everyone. What me and Ky do, it doesn’t mean he loves you any less. We don’t think that you’re too little for this but…sometimes Ky thinks that you’re trying to grow up too fast. And I guess I agree with him.”

Rey slowly pulled away from both of them and quietly moved up the bed. Already in her pyjamas, she looked more tired than she should. It was still early. It was just after dinner. But both Poe and Rey were exhausted. He’d put them both through that. He was still making problems for both of them with how he felt and who he was.

“I saw you two kiss a while ago. It feels like a million years ago, but also yesterday at the same time, so I don’t know anymore,” Rey mumbled. “I was watching, when you were in the basement. Kylo was kissing you and I wanted it to be me until I figured out that there’s space for me too there, since I’m still so small. I need to love more people and so does Kylo. I guess I’m sorry too. I didn’t tell you before. But things have been so much better now. I feel better and Kylo is happy, or he was. I didn’t want to say anything and ruin it.”

“Why would you ruin it?” Kylo asked, forcing himself to turn towards her. He felt Poe shifting closer and his heart matched the movements, getting faster even though the motions were slow.

Rey was watching them. He could never underestimate her again when it came to things like this. Rey was strong and had her own thoughts and mind, but the link that they shared would never be broken. “Can I be…a silly kid for a bit?”

Poe grinned; it was a welcome break and he could drift off into nothing. “Go at it.”

“What if…what if when you guys are big and grown ups? And you’re happy and have a house and I was there too,” Rey paused and licked her lips. “We could have our own family. I love mom and dad. But we’d have our own.”

Poe turned towards him and the look in his eyes made him never want to turn away again. Rey wanted them both. This could be the end to the dark road. Go to college. Join the FBI. Have Poe and Rey at home, at his own home. They’d watch movies and make dinner. Rey would be in high school and they could tell her about how much it sucked. Han and Leia would visit, when he’d let them. And they’d be happy too.

It was a delicious fantasy. It was a tempting world that he wanted to open the door to.

“That doesn’t sound like a silly kid thing. That sounds like…what I want too. But I am just a silly kid too so…” Poe trailed off and tried to laugh, but it came out more like a sob that he was trying to disguise with humour.

In his mind, the make-believe life was still shining in clear reality. He’d stop killers everyday — he’d talk to children who had been hurt and know exactly like what they were feeling. Poe would work with computers or math. He liked that stuff because he could talk to them and they wouldn’t interrupt him. Rey would grow up surrounded by a love that would give her strength. She was going to be so beautiful.

He felt Rey taking his hand and he snapped out of his desired future. Poe’s head was in his hands and he sucked in a breath.

“Stop. It’s going to be okay.” He dropped to his knees without hesitation and reached out with his awkward cast. He needed to say what everyone wanted to hear until he believed it himself. “I…I want it too.”

He said the words but they were unsteady in his mouth. He wanted them to mean more, but they didn’t. He was too tired to feel more. Still, he leaned into Poe and tried to find the feeling again.

“But it’s too far away,” Poe said, his voice broken, his face still bruised and hurting. “Kylo, this is…I don’t even know where I’m living right now. I can only fake being okay for so long. I can’t fucking go home and I don’t know if I can stay here. Will your parents even let me stay here? I’m not mad at you, but think about me right now. I love you. I really do and right now, I don’t have any clothes or anything. I have nothing but you, okay? My mom’s not answering anymore when I try to call on my broken phone. I need my mom too. I can’t just be like you and pick and choose what I feel and when I feel it. What if I go away for too long and you forget about me?”

“I won’t.” For once, he didn’t hesitate with his words; he couldn’t at that moment. He needed to be another person, a better one. Maybe he could try being undead for a while. “I’ll get you a new phone. We’ll talk all of the time, when things get figured out. When I get my car back, I’ll see you all the time. It won’t be the same but I can deal with that. We’ll have the three of us. And Hux, if he doesn’t change his mind.”

Poe leaned forward to kiss him and he leaned into the soft caress of his lips. Rey was watching and he still let himself go in that instant and he just wanted to be somewhere else. Still, when Poe pulled away, he wasn’t smiling. The younger boy with the swollen eye looked at him with a raw seriousness that he rarely saw. “I wish you’d killed my dad.”

“Don’t think like me,” he warned. “I would have killed him if you hadn’t stopped me. And I wouldn’t have regretted it.” He turned to Rey and saw the same fear and tears in her eyes. “Never stop loving me, even when I do bad and stupid things.”

“I won’t,” she said. She swallowed and he saw the monster that he was in her face. But she could look beyond it. They both could. But Rey still firmed her lips. “So don’t lie anymore.”

He nodded then looked at Poe again. He didn’t want to say anything. He just wanted to look at him. He wanted to trace the side of his face that wasn’t hurt; he wanted to remember the part of him that he hadn’t broken.

Kylo had started to believe that he would wake up the next day and he would be taken away. He wouldn’t be able to protect anyone anymore. The police were liars and he’d done something really and truly wrong.

Still Poe leaned his head to meet his forehead. It was delicate and warm. Was this what being in love felt like?

“Do you think your dad hates me? Because I’m not a girl?” Poe’s voice sounded distant, like an old memory that he couldn’t forget even though he wanted to.

Rey sat up and shoved him, breaking them both out of the cycle that they had been drawn into. “He doesn’t care about that part. He’s more mad because you took me but really, I went because I had to. When he figures it out, he’ll be okay. He loves us too much to be mad about boyfriends.”

Sighing, Kylo lowered his voice. “We should go for a drive with him tomorrow. Make it up to him.”

The words and feelings had finally taken the last of his energy. Getting ready for bed was mostly spent in silence. Poe had guided him to the washroom, his hand warm in his. Rey was holding both of their hands, still in her fantasy. She didn’t know how much he wanted it to be his too, but he didn’t know how to make it happen. Rey looked at both of them and then broke away and left for his parents’ room. He waited in the washroom with Poe, brushing their teeth without effort, and watching their reflection in the mirror to avoid hearing what they were saying. All he could look at was how Poe’s face was half gone because of him.

Rey finally came back with more than annoyance in her eyes.

She pushed by them and pulled the shower curtain away from the bathtub. The water started to run and she looked at the stream with a growing tension in her small shoulders.

“I’m taking a bath. You guys can’t be here.”

He looked at Poe and the other boy tried to shrug off the confusion in his eyes. “It’s fine, sweet pea. Take your space. See you later.”

The steps back to his room were spent with him trying to untangle the words that he heard spoken before. It was finally stopped when Poe put his hands on his hips.

“It’s nothing to go overthinking. Don’t go making it into anything bigger.” Poe was looking up at him and his focus was drawn to the dark bruise on his face. He reached up to touch the mark, tracing the edges that spread to his temple. That wound had burst the world open, forcing the light that had only peaked through the gaps into a blast of full sunshine. “I’m sorry what I said before, about my dad. I’m just…I’m still angry, I guess. Angry and sad.”

He didn’t care that the door was open. He leaned down and kissed Poe again, gripping his back and felt the last few hours drain away into the need for the physical contact and release. But Poe gently pushed away and took a deep breath, his head hanging for a second before he started speaking in a low voice.

“We should really talk about this soon before you get out of your head and I…” Poe trailed off after turning out of the kiss. “I’m sorry I was mad before, Kylo, but you put a lot out there and I want to be able to handle it. So give me a little more space in your head too. It was awful to be that angry with you and I never want to feel that way again.”

He rarely made promises to anyone but Rey. Agent Jinn was another exception, along with Paige on good days. It would take a while to count Hux in that small group again. But he’d thought he’d already given Poe that power over him. The last few months, their conversations hadn’t just been about him, they couldn’t have been. He had only distant memories and the details were overwhelmed by emotions. So many of them were connected with the physical side, the aspect that he was desperately trying to unravel. Poe’s angry outburst from before lingered in the back of his mind, reminding him that the things he missed were often the thoughts of others as he fought against himself.

“I can tell you when to stop touching me,” he started, “you should be able to tell me when I’m not listening.”

“Yeah, it’s only fairness. Black and white, no grey here. I’m not going to feel one-hundred percent for a while, and I feel like garbage for yelling at you and causing all of this mess. You think it’s your fault but I just felt so jerked around and hurt and…” Poe met his eyes. “Can you forgive me?”

Kylo swallowed the lump in his throat. “I think so.”

A light smile crossed Poe’s face and leaned closer to him, resting his head on his shoulder. “I’m really not okay right now.”

“I know.” He shook his head and pulled him into a hug. “I’m sorry for who I am.”

“I’m sorry for getting mad and yelling at you rather than talking to you.” Poe’s voice shook as he whispered into his shoulder. “I’m sorry I was so selfish.”

Kylo shook his head and leaned down to kiss him. He needed to chase away both of their sadness. The physical side would help that go away. It had to. He wanted to force his worries away and let a different feeling take over. He’d thought he be alone the rest of his life, but now he’d been forced to realize the truth. Someone loved him not because he was forced to, but because he thought he was worth saving.

The bed squeaked when Poe sat down, pulling him towards him. His arm was still there, broken and clumsy, but he still moved to straddle him. Careful kisses pulled them together, back into sweetness and out of pain. He could feel Poe’s erection directly against his and he moaned into the kiss. They’d have to stop, but if the door weren’t open, he wouldn’t have.

Pressing Poe down against the mattress, he reached for his shirt. The cast stopped him and he sat up and swore. With careful hands, Poe pulled it off, trailing his hands down his chest as he laid back down.

“We need to stop,” Poe said, settling their hands together. “You know I don’t want to but…fuck. We’re not going to be allowed to be alone for along time. And I just want to be alone with you and forget all of this.”

He could only nod and slowly moved away, letting the distance in his mind grow as well. “We have a lot to talk about. I’m sorry I was stubborn about what was upsetting you. And that I didn’t realize we were…dating.”

Poe sat up on his elbows and shrugged. “I’m not asking you to prom or to hold hands with me in the hallway at school. But yeah, maybe it was easier for you to think of it as a friendship and it was mean of me to yell at you like I did, to make you see what I saw. I still can’t believe you let me kiss you. The stuff after, the good stuff and the shitty stuff, I’m not saying that it was all easy. But I really meant what I said. You make me happy. You frustrate me too, but talking to you makes things seem better. Even if things will probably be shitty for a while, I want to be with you.”

Kylo leaned over to kiss him again, the block in his chest shifting again. But he was quiet.

“You’re still figuring all this out still, huh?” Poe asked when he sat back. “The whole having a boyfriend and not a girlfriend?”

“I guess I’m so used to being a huge asshole that…” Kylo started Poe shoved him lightly. He returned the gesture with a slight grin. “Fine. I think I’d hurt a girl, or she wouldn’t understand. This whole time, that’s how I had it in my head. I imagined doing what we do, but with a girl and it’s something that scares me. But I also think I want to be with you because of who you are. I can get scared and you put up with that. I’m sorry for pushing you so hard and hurting you. I never wanted to hurt you.”

Poe reached for his hand and he was willingly pulled down onto the bed. He rested at his side, running his hand down his chest to rest on his hip.

“I do think that I love you,” Kylo said. The word still felt weird in his mouth when he thought about what it meant for them. “I’m just trying to figure out what that means.”

“Want a hint?” Poe asked, tilting his head. He nodded, waiting for him to continue. “It’s something that my mom told me, when I told her that I liked boys more than girls. I was eleven and really couldn’t stop crying everyday. This was years after the first time I was put in foster care and she thought I was still upset about that. But I was hurting myself and my dad was doing twice as much damage. It just kept feeling worse and worse. The world was empty, until I told my mom. Dad had gone to do something and we had a weekend of just her and me. And I straight-up told her. I told her how much I hated myself, how much I thought everyone at school hated me because I thought that they knew…

“So I finally said, hey mom, sorry that you’re Catholic. Sorry that your God and the Pope will hate it, but your son is gay. And she didn’t freak out. She held my hand and let me cry. She said that she loved me and love was a feeling that lets us accept someone for who they are, as long as it isn’t hurting anyone. How you feel better when they come home from wherever just because you’re happy that they’re home. Bad day, good day, nothing day — you’re just like, wow, you’re here. It’s something like, how you’d follow them down the darkest road so they wouldn’t have to be alone. And it’s even better if they’d follow you too,” Poe’s voice had dropped, and he finally looked up once he was done talking. “I’m not asking for forever, or telling you how to think. But no matter what you tell me, no matter how badly you were hurt or what he did to you, I still want to try to make it better.”

Kylo needed to lean over and kiss him, to try to taste the kind words. When he leaned back, he still shook his head. “I went to your house and beat the shit out of your dad.”

“Yeah,” Poe managed to chuckle, even as tears formed in his eyes. “Yeah, you kind of did. Maybe don’t do that again. Maybe just, I don’t know, let me hold your hand at dinner sometime.”

“I think I can do that.” He leaned over and kissed him again. “I’m going to check on Rey. Get changed for bed.”

“You can’t tell me what to do.”

He ignored the remark and quickly stood off the bed. Slipping into the hallway, he softly knocked at the washroom door.

“Come in, Kylo.”

Only Rey’s face was above the water of the tub. She looked over at him and sat up, shaking her wet hair.

“What were you mad about before?” He asked, closing the door. “Not…not a while ago. But when you talked to Han and Leia.”

Rey brought up her hands, breaking the surface of the water. He sat on the edge of the tub, submerging his uncasted hand under the lukewarm water. She was watching him stare at her and was making him wait.

“I asked when I could have a boyfriend,” she answered, finally. “They said that I had to wait until I found a person who liked me that way back. A person who I like talking to and pays attention to how I feel. Like we talk about in therapy.”

He sighed, still touching the water. “Yeah, I guess I think so too. I want you to wait too, Rey. I didn’t really want a boyfriend either. I still don’t think I’m ready to have one.”

Rey narrowed her eyes. “So, when I’m sixteen, maybe I’ll know if I want a boyfriend or not?”

Sitting back, he wiped his hand on his jeans. He didn’t know what to tell her. It had been so much easier before, when they were smaller and were in the dark place, so understand and explain everything that was going on. He had held Rey after she’d cried after Snoke had touched her, hating himself for not being able to stop it. One day, he was able to, but that didn’t make up for the fact that he couldn’t stop it from happening. Now, they were sitting in a safe house, surrounded by people who cared about them and they were the only two people in the world who knew what it was like to hate every second of every day.

“Yeah, but before that, we’ll talk more about what it’s like to have a boyfriend.” He snorted. “It’s actually really hard.” _Especially if you don’t realize that you have one._

Rey looked up at him and shook her head. “I already know that you have to kiss him and drive him around in your car. And he gets to sleep in your bed, but only if mom and dad say that it’s okay. And even if they say it’s not okay if you’re both really sad.”

Kylo stood, smoothing his hair. “I know that you’re thinking about other things.”

She stuck her tongue out at him. “Of course I am. But I want to go to bed.”

“Did you wash your hair?”

She pouted and then shook her head.

As he was helping her rub the shampoo into her hair and then rinsing her under the faucet, she suddenly stopped to look up at him.

“Will you be my boyfriend when I’m older, Kylo?” she asked. “You already let me kiss you, and then drive me in your car. And I sleep in your bed.”

He looked at her, dripping wet and naked in the off-white bathtub. When he was six, there were too many toys in the bathtub. She had none.

“Only if you still want me to, when you’re older,” he finally said. “Maybe you won’t want me then.”

“Of course I will,” she said firmly.

He closed the washroom door on his way out and screamed internally. He couldn’t punch a wall without making too much noise. He couldn’t do anything to hurt himself without drawing attention to himself. He was trapped between three rooms.

“Go to bed, Ben,” came his father’s voice from their bedroom.

He grunted and left the hallway, escaping to the person who was the least angry at him at this point.

Shaking his head, he left the door half closed and took off his jeans. It was almost summer, he didn’t need pyjamas. He frowned and picked up the rest of Poe’s clothes off the floor to drop into the laundry basket. Finally, he was able to crawl into bed and hug the boyfriend who had caused all of these problems for him.

“You didn’t really,” Kylo said aloud, completing his own thought.

“I didn’t what?” Poe asked, kissing his hairline.

“Nothing.”

They were both yawning when Rey came back. She was wearing new pyjamas and he didn’t know where they came from.

“I’m going to sleep in my room tonight, okay?” She was shifting her weight from side to side. “I’m really tired and need to think.”

She was pouting, still hurt about this. Even though he didn’t want to, he nodded. “It’s okay. I’m fine now and want you to feel that way too.”

Breaking out into a smile, she nodded. “Goodnight. I love you.”

She left the door half-closed and he exhaled, tightening his arms around Poe.

He still didn’t know how to feel and where his heart was. It was beating, steadily, in his chest, but it was also somewhere else too, beyond him. Their relationship should have never been a secret. He shouldn’t have pushed Poe to a breaking point, forcing him to confront him. It was good that he’d been angry with him, he decided; that meant he didn’t want to lose him either. He loved him, he wanted to be with him. He still couldn’t figure out why, though. He had missed how he really felt for too long. Poe deserved someone better.

“Stop thinking and go to sleep.” Poe whispered. “Just be here with me for a while.”

He could do that.

The future was terrifying, but he could be there with him right then and avoid dealing with it for a while.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Standard warnings: mentions of past rape and murder, acts of violence, teenage boys sharing feelings.
> 
> I'm still not satisfied with this chapter but I've reworked it like 20 times and it's not getting any better so might as well put it up there (an original draft had them meeting up with Jinn but it just felt weird and I redid it). I've tried to iron out how inconsistent Poe feels in this chapter and still don't think I'm there but meh. The next chapter is all Rey and includes the time jump into adulthood for the boys and Agent Jinn becoming more or less a main character for the rest of the story (hint hint at Kylo's future). There will be a lot of hurt feelings in Chapter 26 (sorry in advance for some of the angst there) and then Chapter 27 really sets in the next part of the story. Chapter 28 is taking shape but I'm struggling with how it flows...gah.
> 
> Thanks so much for reading!


	25. Chapter 25

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey deals with the past, present, and future over three years. 
> 
> See chapter notes for warnings.

 

Rey always wondered when time would start speeding up. She couldn’t sleep enough to make time start to feel faster and every day was too long.

It was exciting to be done with school, but also made her worry. Summers were always so long with too much to do; the other kids said that summer was the best time because there was so much to do. She was supposed to go to camp that year, if she was ready. It would be fun to be at camp with Rose and Finn and have new stories to tell Kylo.

Being at home still made her confused and left her with an overwhelming feeling of hurt, but not for only herself. She talked about that with Ahsoka, telling her how Kylo had a boyfriend and he wasn’t a secret boyfriend anymore. And he was going to live with them one day, because that’s what Kylo said would happen. Ahsoka had asked her if she had been frightened when they were in the car, driving to an unknown place. Rey said she wasn’t scared; Kylo would never hurt her and was trying to protect them all from bad people. She told Ahsoka how Poe’s mom came by the house a few days after school ended and Rey had listened from upstairs as they talked. There were a few bags by the front door and she wanted to tell Kylo that it was happening then; he was staying forever.

Dad had made Kylo leave the house for the conversation. Mom didn’t want her listening, but she did it for him.

Poe’s mom was going to move back to Florida and he had to come with her; Rey’s heart was instantly in her throat for Kylo. He wouldn’t be able to handle having him far away. It’s what their parents had tried to warn them about: things weren’t going to be easy. Above all, Kylo wouldn’t think it was fair.

She said that they were getting a divorce. And that Poe’s father didn’t want to see him ever again.

There were a lot of tears. Rey’s heart hurt more every time Poe hugged his mom. Kylo was making him choose between him and his mom and that wasn’t fair either. He’d have to be gone for the first few months of summer, living somewhere far away, in a state that she’d never been to.

That night, after Mrs Dameron left to finish packing, Kylo showed her on a map and she shook her head, not believing that the world was so big. Kylo had held her hand and Poe had frowned; he didn’t want to go back there, even if it was just for the summer. And he didn’t like how everyone was still mad at him. He pointed out where his family was on the map and it meant nothing to Rey except that it was far away and there were too many alligators there. She’d never even seen a real alligator before, just cartoon ones on kids' shows.

She didn’t have to ask Kylo how he was feeling. His face was just blank; that’s when he was the most angry. They had snuck back to Poe’s house right after the thing with the police, but before his mom got back in touch. She really didn’t want them to get in trouble, but it was even worse if they were in danger. Poe had stayed with them since then, trying to study but mostly looking sad. He would look at Han and Leia like they would kick him out at any minute. Kylo took his side in any argument and was really mean to mom and dad until he realized that he wouldn’t get what he wanted if he didn’t act more mature. Rey didn’t want Kylo to be that way because if he was, then he’d be grown up too fast.

But Poe’s mom had made a promise: if he wanted, he could come back. If mom and dad said yes. If it was what he really wanted. If it’s what they _both_ wanted. There were too many ifs and Rey had trouble getting to sleep with all of the possible things that could happen. Would he choose Kylo or his family?

The boys spent that night in the basement and promised to leave the door open. Rey slept in mom and dad’s bed and asked them what a divorce was. She thought she knew, but needed someone to tell her. When they explained it to her, Rey realized that she knew it the entire time.

The next morning, Poe had to go and she was waiting for Kylo to turn silent, be angry, and argue with everyone again.

But he didn’t.

They sat for a long time on the porch the first night, looking at the stars. He told her that the stars would look a little different in Florida. She said that they had already learnt that in school. And he smiled at her, telling her that he was proud that she liked school and asked if she still wanted to go back in September. She nodded, telling him that she liked school more now that her stomach didn’t hurt so often anymore, and that her underwear felt better since she knew why it was hurting before. Then she asked if he was sad that Poe wouldn’t be there for a while. He smiled again—and it wasn’t a fake smile—and shook his head; it meant more time for him and her. And then he told her that they’d made a promise and it wouldn’t be broken. He had to be patient for once, be more mature.

The beginning of summer was just them; Kylo wouldn’t hide his sadness from her and tell her what he was thinking about. She knew that he was keeping some things private, but he was allowed to because he was sharing enough. No more lying. He would read and write more and she could read some of his journals, but only some parts. Ahsoka would come by a lot, taking her wherever she wanted to go; they went to the zoo so she could see an alligator. But Kylo was there too, waiting for her at home. He’d go for walks or be in the basement with his weight set. The first few weeks were like that. Time felt better then; it was less rippled.

When he wasn’t eating, she would take food from his plate until he smiled and ate more.

He taught her how to ride a bike before she left for camp. It was harder than she thought. Balancing shouldn’t be that hard. She didn’t like not being good at things. She fell and skinned her knee on the first try doing it alone, when Kylo let go. His eyes were panicked, wide and filled with regret, when he ran to her. But he calmed down and knelt next to her. His face cleared and she felt her heart flutter; he was getting better and so was she. He covered her torn skin with his hand and told her that it was okay to cry. It would always be okay to cry. When he was helping her put on a band aid, after cleaning out the gravel, he dried her tears and she hugged him to smell his hair.

In that moment, she realized that she was starting to forget what it was like to be there. This would be a new scar, but from something good.

There were still nightmares and times when she got so frustrated that she would scream. That’s when time would slow down and be mean to her. Kylo would hold her when she let out her monsters; she knew that he would take long walks in the woods and do the same thing.

She’d hear him talking to Poe at night. They’d talk for hours. She’d fall asleep listening to Kylo just talk about nothing, or sit there quietly as he listened. He listened more than he talked. She’d wake up next to him and he would have already been awake, studying or reading. Agent Jinn would send him emails that he would read to her. He was on his computer more, but his stacks of journals still got bigger.

Rey had started decorating his room with her drawings. She’d tape up the pictures and ask him what he thought that he meant. He was right every time.

Camp wasn’t as fun as she thought it would be. Rose was afraid of swimming in the lake because it might have a monster in it—Paige had told her that—and Finn just wanted to hang out with other kids he said were “cooler” than them. Before she left, Kylo had told her that she could come home whenever she wanted. It wasn’t anything to be worried about. She’d call him from camp and have to wait if the phone was busy. But when they talked, the hurt went away. She was getting better with talking on the phone. It was easier to see his face in her mind now. She was finally starting to grow up.

But she lasted the entire two weeks. She decided that if she was starting to grow up, then she would have to deal with things that frustrated her and be more mature too: how the other kids would ask about her scars when she went swimming, how an older girl decided that she didn’t like her and locked her out of her cabin, how Rose thought that monsters were real even though she didn’t have to live with one for four years. She would try to do what Ahsoka said she should do. She would put her angry thoughts into her pictures. But instead of keeping them, she’d rip them up. Kylo kept all of his memories in his books but she didn’t want hers anymore. The only thing she wished she remembered were her parents; she’d always have Kylo’s kindness so she could start to lose who they were in that house.

When she got home, she only had happy memories and happy pictures. The bad ones were little pieces of paper in the garbage. She learned how to sew and showed Kylo what she’d made instead of talking about the bad things.

Kylo would spend every day hanging out with Hux after that, at least for a few hours. They’d go for walks, or have Paige and Liza come over. And then, just Paige was coming over. And then one night, she saw Hux and Paige kissing on the porch when she went out to ask if they wanted ice cream after dinner.

Summer still felt too long. She’d go to the library with Kylo and instead of sitting with the other kids, she’d help him find the right books for next year at school. That lasted about a week until he asked if she’d have more fun at the story circle. She got embarrassed; he’d seen that she thought what he was doing was boring.

They spent July Fourth at home. Lumpy was scared of the fireworks and she didn’t want him to be alone. But they could still see the fireworks on television.

By the end of July, she could ride her bike to Rose’s house. Kylo said that she was doing it alone, but she knew that he followed her to keep her safe.

The last week of August, Poe came home. Home to Kylo. Mom and dad had argued with Kylo all summer about how this wasn’t a good idea, but if they had thought long and hard enough about the future, then they would still support them. Kylo wouldn’t let them say no; he showed them some plan he had written out about the next few years. He included when he wanted Rey to come and live with them after college and Han said that he needed to think about that part of the plan the most.

She thought about how long the two had hugged at the airport, standing next to Poe’s one suitcase. Kylo finally turned and she could hug them both too. Poe’s hair was shorter and his skin was tanned. He was also taller and a bit thinner; but he bought her a stuffed dolphin and thanked her for taking care of Kylo the entire summer.

So when school started again, she told her new teacher that her not-brother’s boyfriend was living with them and maybe he was also a sort of not-brother to her. That was her summary of the summer. The other kids had all talked about stories about going to camp or watching the fireworks on July Fourth. But she wanted her story to be about how her heart now had another person living in it.

Her teacher looked at her like Han and Leia did to the boys over dinner, when they started whispering to one another and grinning. Or when Han had yell at them to stop kissing in the kitchen when they thought that no one else was home, but they had just gone to the store for fifteen minutes. How Leia would make sure they’d let Rey play whatever game they were playing or not to sit so close on the couch when they were watching television. And how they couldn’t spend all the damned time in the basement doing _whatever_.

One time, Leia got really mad and Rey wasn’t allowed to listen when she talked to them. They both looked really embarrassed when they left Kylo’s room. When she asked mom what she’d said to them, Leia looked her right in the eye and said it was about sex and what they needed to know about it. Mom told her how sex between two boys was different than sex with between a boy and a girl, not the emotional parts but with how their bodies worked. She didn’t want to tell mom that Ahsoka had already told her all of these things. Kylo and Poe sat on opposite sides of the table for a while after that and Leia’s eyes were hard at their ‘protest’—or at least that’s what Han had called it when he was tucking her into bed that night.

But the looks got softer as time kept going. Maybe time got faster when she loved more people.

Poe took her trick or treating for Halloween, trying to make sure that she still liked him. He was more relaxed by then. He talked more and would sit on the kitchen island and eat cereal at night. She wanted to try trick or treating that year because Poe told her it was a chance for them to make memories together. But she also guessed that it was because he wanted to dress up and get candy too. She gave him the candy that she didn’t want when they came home. Kylo told her all about the other costumes he’d seen on the kids that night and said that their costumes were the best. Poe had rolled his eyes and tossed a chocolate bar at him.

Grandma came for Thanksgiving and just patted Kylo’s hand when he was trying to explain who and what Poe was. Grandma asked Poe if he missed his family and Poe looked sad for a while before saying that he missed his real family, but his new family loved him more.

Then it was Christmas and she got to buy her own presents for everyone. She got an allowance now to not do too many chores to make sure the boys cared about the house too. Uncle Luke shook his head for a long time when he came and talked to mom and dad before dinner. He looked tired at first, but by the end of Christmas Eve, he was joking with Poe and it was Kylo’s turn to look embarrassed.

But Christmas meant another new year. Finally, the time was running out and she was almost seven.

Kylo got her a blank cookbook; it was one in which they could write their own recipes. All three of them would make different things in the kitchen together: they needed to remember when it worked, but even more when it didn’t work. The pizza they made once was so bad that even dad wouldn’t eat it.

The boys were more careful after the talk with mom. The downstairs room was Poe’s now but the door always had to be open at night. Same with Kylo’s door. Poe didn’t want to take anything that Han and Leia gave him, and Kylo and Rey had to convince him that it was okay. He was just happy to have a bed and not have to have a job, he’d said; he didn’t need new clothes or other things. On nights when she’d had a bad day or the shadow people had been following her, Kylo slept in his own room, with her cuddled against him until it felt better. Ahsoka tried to teach her how to understand the shadow people and what they wanted; mom and dad told her to ignore them but Ahsoka said it was important to recognize when and where the shadow people were. And then maybe they could figure out why they were there and how they could make them go away.

At least the people didn’t have Snoke’s face anymore.

Poe would come with them to therapy with Maz. The first few times, he sat and waited. Then, Kylo said that Maz wanted them to come in with him. They all needed help.

Rey quit gymnastics and just took dance instead. It had been a hard decision; she sat with Poe and Kylo on Kylo’s bed, talking about what she liked best about both. Ahsoka had told her that it was okay to dislike things. By her birthday in the spring, her teacher told her that she would be in advanced group the next year if she wanted to. Rey said that she had to think about it. She didn’t want to leave Rose behind. Maybe she could help her get better if they spent more time together.

And then school ended and it was summer again.

Kylo and Poe went down to Florida by themselves for a month because Poe’s mom was getting married and was going to have a new baby. Rey wanted to come, but then thought about it more. She needed to have some time on her own now that she was seven. She didn’t want to go to camp that year; she wanted something different. She and Ahsoka had made a checklist of everything that she wanted to do; going to Florida wasn’t on the list yet. Kylo kept asking her to come, that he’d buy her the ticket and take care of her. No, she said. She wanted mom and dad to take her on different trips. They went and stayed in a cabin. Han taught her how to fish and she got to be in a boat for the first time. She never got to be in a boat at camp because Rose had been too afraid. Then they went out to the coast so Rey could swim in the same ocean as the boys.

When they came home, the boys were quiet for a week, avoiding one another. Rey wanted to ask what happened, but could see something else in the looks that they shared at dinners that week; they were short looks with quick eyes. Han got frustrated by Wednesday and asked what the hell was wrong and they both said nothing. She didn’t believe them, but didn’t say anything. But by Sunday, they were fine again. She caught them making out on the couch when she thought that they were watching a movie. She tossed a pillow and laughed at them when they realized that she was there and scrambled apart. Poe hit her with a pillow in return but Kylo just blushed.

They were both getting taller and bigger. She wasn’t growing fast enough. Time was always messing with her, tricking her when it wanted to.

 

-=-

 

Rey held Agent Jinn’s hand on the back porch and she asked him if he was proud of Kylo.

“Of course I am. Sometimes I think it’s strange that it’s been four years, but I’m very proud of you both.” He squeezed her hand lightly and his eyes crinkled as he smiled. “How did you feel today?”

Rey shrugged. The months leading up to Kylo’s graduation had been hard. He had been studying more for every exam and work harder on every project. His frustration made it hard to relax in the house and he knew that and just ignored them. He’d slam his door in both of her and Poe’s faces, afraid that he wouldn’t get a good grade. Poe would just shrug and they’d play a game or read a book in his room. He’d show her pictures of his baby twin brothers on his phone and said he was so glad that they looked like their dad and not his dad. She liked looking at pictures of babies and thinking about what they’d look like when they’d grow up. Babies had so much time.

The big exam, whatever it was called, Kylo had done in the fall. Dad told her that he’d done _exceptional_ and they went to a nice restaurant to celebrate. It was really fancy and didn’t have a kids’ menu. That made her feel more mature.

But Kylo didn’t look happy about it and he’d told them that he wanted to wait a year to go to college. He needed more work experience, whatever that meant, but also wanted to wait for Poe. That didn’t mean he could be lazy, he’d said. He still needed good grades now, but a year off would be good.

Even Poe didn’t know that Kylo wanted to wait until that day after the exam results.

Now, the house was filled with people who they were close to and she had asked Agent Jinn if they could go somewhere to be alone and away from the family party. And Rey didn’t really want to celebrate the fact that he’d be going away in a year. The thought of him going away at any point was carving a deep hole in her heart and she didn’t know who to talk to about it. Poe didn’t want Kylo to wait a year either. He didn’t want him to be bored. Rey felt the same confliction, but part of her wanted Kylo to stay home longer too. It would be hard with him gone, but it was even harder to have the reminder that his leaving was coming whether she liked it or not.

“Not good,” she finally answered Agent Jinn. “I don’t like thinking about Kylo going away.”

“Well, he’s going to wait a year.”

She bit her lip. She’d almost chewed it raw that day. “Me and Poe think it’s our fault. He wants to wait for both of us.”

Jinn sighed and guided her to the swing dad had put in that spring for her birthday. She’d helped him paint it while the boys tossed a baseball on the lawn, not doing anything useful. She heard them joking in Spanish to one another. The look on Poe’s face whenever Kylo spoke to him in that language leached happiness to her; Kylo was working really hard to make sure everyone was happy on good days.

Until he started thinking about the future on bad days and got nervous and angry and started hiding away again from them.

“Well, maybe I’m a bit to blame here too.” Agent Jinn admitted and she frowned at him. “I think that college will be a big adjustment for him. Depending how far away he is from his support, his family, he might stumble at first and get frustrated. I know that he doesn’t like to give up, but being alone isn’t something that I think is good for him.”

“He’s not very good at making friends,” Rey said, knowing that she was just repeating something that dad said all of the time. “Do you think he can really be an FBI agent?”

His blue eyes met hers and she knew that he was going to tell her the truth. Grinning, he looked up at the sky and she followed his gaze. “He’s very good at knowing how to analyze crimes. I’ve tried to get him away from murder, into things like robbery or arson or computer crime, but he only wants one thing. He just wants to know why people hurt one another in the worst way.”

She swallowed. All of Kylo’s wants were what made him come back to feeling better: he wanted her to be happy, he wanted to see Poe smile at him, and he wanted mom and dad to not look at him and frown all of the time. But the thing he wanted most was to work with Agent Jinn. Kylo had put a checklist on the fridge and everyone had to look at it everyday. Han tried covering it up with a newspaper article about clowns and Kylo just tore it down, telling him not to touch his things. She finally put one of her drawings over it so he would know not to tear it off.

“How long does that take?” she asked, still thinking about the list.

Agent Jinn just exhaled. “A lot longer than he thinks. But if he waits a year, he’ll be more mature and maybe, just maybe, he’ll find something at college that he wants to study more.”

They both heard the stumbling footsteps behind the back door and then muffled laughter. Rey was used to Kylo knowing where to look when she heard something strange, so it was nice to have another adult register the sounds. Because Kylo was an adult now. He was eighteen. He didn’t have to stay there if he really didn’t want to.

The backdoor opened and Poe and Kylo stumbled out of it, arms wrapped around one another, kissing in a way that she was rarely allowed to see for too long. They were also looking for somewhere private.

Kylo pulled away first, blinking and wiping at his mouth. He tried to stand up straighter and fixed his shirt. Rey could see how his hands balled into fists for a moment as he looked at them. “Um. Hi George.”

Poe’s face was bright red and he stepped behind Kylo. She could hear him swearing to himself, resting his head on Kylo’s shoulder to hide his eyes.

“It looks like you two got bored,” Agent Jinn asked, his tone teasing them. “Or were you looking for me?”

Clearing his throat, Kylo glanced at Poe and then back at them. Poe had been nervous all day about seeing Agent Jinn again. At the ceremony, he tried to sit as far away from him as he could, but Agent Jinn seemed to see what he was trying to do and sat next to him anyway. Poe kept looking at her with wide eyes throughout the ceremony whenever the agent tried to talk to him in hushed tones in the auditorium. _I want to die_ , he’d mouthed, _please kill me now_. Rey giggled and he looked even more afraid when he had to talk to him again.

“I was looking for you and then we got distracted.” Kylo said, then he swallowed. “I wanted to thank you again for coming, with how busy you are. It meant a lot to me.” Poe nudged Kylo and he looked at him sharply before he looked back and nodded. “And for all of your help over the years.”

Jinn stood and she followed, crossing the porch. “I couldn’t miss this, Kylo. This was a very important day for you, so it means a great deal to me too.”

Smiling, Kylo embraced him. Poe’s hand looked lonely so Rey took it and he draped his arms over her shoulders. Kylo was taller than dad now, but not as tall as Agent Jinn. It was almost strange to see someone taller in the house. When they stepped apart, Rey watched Kylo try to look taller again, like he’d done the entire day.

“We’ve talked about coming to the ceremony next year.” Poe found his voice with his arms around her and she leaned into him. Despite how tall Kylo was, Poe still felt perfectly. “Do you think it would make everyone mad if we showed up there too? Would people get pissed or something?”

Rey had heard them talking when the anniversary had rolled by them that spring. Next year would be five years. And she really wanted to go to California for it. Kylo did too. And whatever Kylo did, Poe would want to do it with him.

“We’d like you to be there. Many of the families have been asking about how the survivors are doing. Maybe this time we can give them actually faces and facts and not just rumours. It might be healing as well to come there before starting the next chapter of your life.” Jinn turned from them to Kylo who nodded quickly. “But that’s almost a year away. Let’s go inside now. We can talk more about that another day.”

Kylo closely followed Agent Jinn and Rey kept her hand in Poe’s as they went back inside. Mom and dad were sitting at the table, talking with grandma and Mrs Hux. It wasn’t a big party. Mom and dad’s friends had been there earlier; Kylo said that they could only come if they left early. He didn’t even care about the presents that they brought for him. He said that they could use the money to do something fun together, whatever Rey and Poe wanted. She hoped that it would be a trip to a hotel with a waterpark or maybe even a real waterpark. She could hear music still playing in the living room. Kylo didn’t invite many friends from school; it made mom worried but Poe said that it was okay. They mostly hung out as a small group anyway. But she knew who was fooling around—again, dad’s words—with the music. It kept changing after a song started playing for a few seconds to another, then another. Hux must have been playing with the music and she could just see Paige’s face in her mind, frowning but still hiding happiness in her eyes.

She should have told Agent Jinn how good she was at imagining now but she had forgot.

Guiding Poe away from the kitchen, she left the others and made him come too. Kylo started talking with mom and dad and she let his voice fade from his ears. He didn’t want to say that he was happy about today, but he was.

Luke was drinking a beer on the couch and watching Paige and Hux argue about the music. Mr and Mrs Tico walked by them, rolling their eyes at their daughter and her boyfriend. She knew that Mr Tico didn’t like Hux that much. Kylo had said that Rose and Finn could come tonight for her but she didn’t want them to. She wanted to be there in case Poe got lonely. Rose had told her how much her father yelled at Paige about it. But they looked happy and cute together. Just like Kylo and Poe. People in love should be together.

The idea that Poe loved Kylo was easy to understand. She knew that by how he looked at him. He would be tired from studying, sitting at the kitchen table, and Kylo would finally come down from his room and Poe’s face would change. He’d go from frustrated to happy as fast as she could blink. Kylo would stop and tilt his head, eyeing him, before grinning and the hours apart seemed to be forgiven. Rey had started doing her homework together with Poe just to see the looks. And to see Kylo bend down to kiss Poe before grabbing something from the fridge and leaving to do something else, teasing Poe to follow after him.

Kylo’s feelings for Poe were more hidden to her. Since they were always around her, she didn’t get to talk to Kylo about how he felt about him that much anymore. They would talk about other things: how school was going, how dance was going, how she felt after therapy. If she’d seen the shadow people again. If there was a boy in her class that she had a crush on. Kylo would still be sad and angry; there were still days when he didn’t want to talk to anyone and pushed everyone away. But working together, Poe and Rey made him smile again. And she’d make sure that Poe wasn’t sad either. And they’d both help each other if Kylo was having a down day. But the days that Kylo felt the most for Poe made it easier not to be sad. Those were the days when she’d see them sitting on the couch, just looking at one another. Kylo said so much more by how he acted when he was calm than in anything that he said.

She sat on Poe’s lap as they invaded Luke’s space. She wanted to tell her uncle to not put his feet on the coffee table, especially without socks.

“Oh good, my favourite girl and my nephew-in-law. Come to save me from this messed up musical chairs?” Luke gestured with his hand to Paige and Hux. “Just pick a song! It all sounds like garbage.”

Rey giggled and she heard Paige groan and snatch Hux’s phone from his hands. Finally, the same song played longer than twenty seconds. And Paige and Hux moved away from them and into a corner to talk. His hand brushed hers so she guessed that they were done arguing.

Luke looked over at them and sighed. “I think I was that young once. But I can’t remember. Poe, go get me a beer. Get one for yourself too.”

Shaking his head, Poe still shifted her from his lap to sit next to Luke. “No, I think it’s fine. I mean, I don’t want to…Han and Leia, I mean…”

“Just tell them I said that it was okay.” And then Luke winked.

Rey watched Poe back out of the living room. He mouthed again: _kill me now_. She laughed because she didn’t know what else to do.

“A drink will loosen him up,” Luke sighed. “I thought Ben was the one that didn’t like people.”

Studying Uncle Luke, Rey shrugged. She had slowly got to know him and it was a journey that had taken longer than with other people. She liked weekends at grandma’s and sleepovers at the Tico household; the food would be different, the rooms were shaped differently, and something had always changed. Grandma was showing her how to crochet and taught her how to poach an egg. Mrs Hux would help her walk the dog on some evenings, and would watch him when they were away. Hux had been worried about graduating too and she would tell her about that. But Luke seemed to move all the time and she couldn’t even send him a letter and know that it would get to him. She wanted to ask what he liked to do; what she wanted to know was why he was always moving.

“Poe is trying to not embarrass Kylo. He thinks he embarrasses him by being younger and how he talks too much and does weird things,” Rey answered, sticking out her legs. She was getting stronger. She could see it in her calves. Dancing was so much better than gymnastics. “They had a big argument this morning because Kylo says that he’s not embarrassed.”

It had started right after breakfast, when they were going to be late to the ceremony. Kylo’s door was shut and she heard them shouting at one another, followed by silence. She rolled her eyes and left her spy mission when the bed springs creaked. They weren’t even that late and Kylo’s hair still looked perfect.

“But they don’t argue around you, right?” Luke asked.

“They always close the door, since it’s daytime. Poe doesn’t want Kylo to wait to go to college. But I think he feels bad that he’ll still be staying here without him.” Rey reached for the pop that she put down earlier. Her cup, the pink one, still sat on the coffee table beside Luke’s gross feet. She didn’t like how diet soda tasted but knew that the regular stuff was bad for her. “I know he feels bad. He told me.”

They both sat up as they heard Poe’s laugh getting closer. He did show up with two beers and Rey watched him hand Luke one before sitting on the floor and sipping his own.

“It’s okay, sweet pea. I cleared it with the higher ups,” He winked and nudged her with his elbow. It would be fine if he had just one, she decided, “So, now you guys can stop talking about me and we can start talking about how Ky looked like a dork in that stupid hat.”

“Next year that will be you, dork,” Luke teased. “Just take the money, Poe.”

Biting his bottom lip for a moment, Poe looked down and then took a long drink from his bottle. At Christmas, Kylo had given Poe a blank cheque for a Christmas gift. Rey didn’t understand what it meant until Han and Leia cleared their throats and said that his college would be paid for too, when he wanted it. Poe had just stared at them and the cheque. Rey didn’t understand why she heard Kylo arguing with him afterwards. It didn’t ruin Christmas, but it was something that wasn’t really brought up again.

“I’m starting to think that maybe college isn’t for me,” Poe finally said. “But maybe in a year I’ll change my mind. I don’t know. I just know that I can’t leave him alone. He’ll go all meltdown and probably think that the dean is planning to kill him or something the first time that he gets a bad grade.”

Rey narrowed her eyes. “Why would you do something that you wouldn’t want to do?”

Poe sat up, the beer bottle against his lips. He glanced over his shoulder and Rey could see him looking at Kylo.

“Because you love someone. That’s why.”

 

-=-

 

They attended the five-year anniversary in California. Rey was excited to go on a plane now that she was nine. But Han and Leia didn’t come. They said that they never wanted to go there again and it was important for the three of them to be there by themselves. And Agent Jinn had promised to look after them, or have someone from his team make sure they didn’t get into trouble. For Rey, it was to see where she had been born. For Kylo, it was to see where he had died. And for Poe, it was to understand this part of their lives and realize how far they had come.

So many of the other families were there and Rey recognized them through the memories that still surfaced when she let them. Their faces were like many of the children, but older and sadder and more alive.

Her wall wasn’t as good as Kylo’s yet. She had wanted to throw out her drawings of the other children but couldn’t let that part go yet.

Kylo had started pinning up pictures and things from newspapers and the computer on his wall about Snoke. It became a project that made her and Poe worry. They would sit and try to do homework on Kylo’s bed as he mapped out connections and locations. _That’s kind of creepy, Ky_ , Poe would say, _but keep doing it if it makes you feel better_.

The six weeks that he had spent in Virginia after Christmas had only narrowed his focus.

Agent Jinn had arranged for a special internship for him. Kylo had spent the summer and the fall working at the police station, doing clerk duties and keeping his mouth shut. He did the same filing work part-time at mom’s office. He would still come home and complain how stupid their local police were, how most of the cops there hadn’t seen as much death in all of their careers as he had in one year. Poe would shrug at him, saying that he had to study. Kylo would let his shoulders drop and kiss him on the cheek as he sat next to him. He helped him study and Rey would bring them the cookies that she had baked that afternoon. They would eat cookies and she would listen to Kylo correct Poe’s language on an essay, or some formula that he didn’t understand in chemistry. She could feel the stress coming off of Poe’s body in waves. And he wouldn’t calm down until Kylo did too, pushing the books aside and hugging him. He would push him, but never too far.

But the internship meant six weeks of just Rey and Poe. Kylo left for Virginia and Rey had to stand in the airport with Poe, watching him go.

Even though he hated studying, Poe worked even harder after that. She started sleeping in his bed a few nights a week to make sure that he wasn’t alone.

Kylo could only text or call in the evenings, telling them that he could talk then. They’d talk with him on the computer, sharing headphones, and Rey liked seeing the guestroom of Agent Jinn’s house. He’d sometimes sit with Kylo, making him talk about anything else other than what he’d done that day. She’d say goodnight and Poe would close the door to talk to Kylo alone. Sometimes, she would hear tears in Poe’s muted voice as he told Kylo how much he missed him. She wouldn’t be able to Kylo’s responses and hoped that he was being kind.

And Kylo came home obsessed with how to solve a case that had been solved for five years because he’d killed the man that had raped, tortured, and murdered children.

But standing in the California sun for the first time in all of those years, Rey couldn’t help but understand why he wanted to explore that part again.

The old house had been demolished years ago. It was a park now; rows and rows of trees filled the lot. The development of the city had started to stretch out into the rural area, but the neighbours knew and had to remember their story. The trees were neat and ordered; they represented life and not death. Death was never anything that could be put into a clean row, Kylo had said. Still, Rey wished that she had been allowed to see the house one last time, to see if it matched how it looked in her mind. She could still feel the grit on the stairs when she was forced down them with bare and torn feet. The last time, when her broken arm ached as Snoke grabbed at her underwear and pushed her against a wall, the texture of it had scratched her face. That was before Kylo killed him and saved her. Would it have felt the same?

Instead, she just smelt trees.

Once the crowd had broken up, and Kylo was left talking to reporters, she’d snuck away to find someone else to talk to.

And she found him, also staring at the trees.

“Hello, Rey.” Agent Jinn smiled at her, kneeling down. “What did you think of the ceremony?”

“It was nice,” she said. “They said everybody’s names. It took a really long time.”

He nodded. “We know them all now.”

They’d planted two new trees for the two last names. The total was forty-three. Not all of them died there. But all of the trees were there. Kylo had told her about how the other sites, in Colorado and Connecticut, had become places where people obsessed with their case liked to go and do weird things. It was still weird to Rey that it was about a case and not about the people. California had to be where the memories should stand. They could be protected there.

It’s also where her family was.

She hadn’t told Kylo why she really wanted to come to the ceremony. She’d said it was to see him give his speech; it was short and he hadn’t looked as nervous as she knew that he’d felt. He just wanted to say something, anything. He wanted to look the reporters and families in the eyes and say that he was a survivor and wished he had been braver, but all of the other kids had been brave too. They had never forgotten their families and the families had to keep those memories going on into the future. When he sat down, between Poe and Rey, they both took his hands. She leaned against him and saw him quiver. He’d held something back: how he’d helped kill them and had to be cold to them at times in order to survive.

She heard shouting over her shoulder and was knocked out of the memory and her own head. She felt like Kylo when he spaced out and missed something; the instant anger and not always listening made her heart quicken.

“I’ll be right back.” Agent Jinn was already striding towards the small crowd of people that had gathered on the other side of the rows of chairs that also lined the park. She trailed after, spotting Kylo shoving a man in a brown suit. Poe was trying to get between them and that made her quicken her pace.

“What’s happening here?” Agent Jinn’s voice never sounded like that when he spoke with her. His voice was always kind and calm; now, it was angry and commanding. “Where’s your pass?”

His eyes were on the strange man. “He must have knocked it off of me.”

“No I didn’t,” Kylo argued. “He’s not supposed to be here without a pass! He is just pretending to be with the families. He’s the reporter who…”

Agent Jinn’s eyes snapped towards Kylo and he shut up in an instant. His cheeks were flushed and his eyes were still enraged even as he took a step back to drop his head. She moved to stand closer to him. His hand rested on her shoulder, but she also saw how his other hand was gripped tightly in Poe’s.

“Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to leave. This event is only open to members of the public who have been cleared with security. Without a pass, I can’t allow you to harass this man.” Agent Jinn was already leading the red-faced man away by the arm, gripping him hard. He shouted to some other officers and the man disappeared into the crowd.

She spotted some of the parents looking at them and wanted to disappear.

“What did he say?” She asked.

“He’s the one that wrote that stupid book,” Poe spoke for Kylo. “He still wants Ky to admit the things that the did, like he wasn’t forced to do them. He has some stupid blog now and just keeps making things up. He doesn’t fucking understand.”

“You should have let me hit him,” Kylo mumbled. “He won’t let it go away. All I wanted to do was come here and make it all go away.”

Shaking her head, she leaned back against them. She slowly turned and hugged both of their waists. “I love you both.”

“Love you too,” Kylo said weakly. “We should go back to the hotel so no one can bother us anymore.”

Their car was waiting. They could go back at anytime.

“Can I stay and talk to Agent Jinn for a bit?” She looked up and tried not to sound too sad. “He’ll bring me back.”

Kylo looked tired. He also looked like he wanted to say something to her. _Are you sure? They’ll ask you questions too._

She shrugged. _It’s important to me._

He exhaled and looked at Poe. “As long as you’re sure, sweet pea. Get him to call us when you’re on your way back, okay?”

The led her to a chair and each hugged her before taking the long walk across the grass. She spotted the brown-suited man arguing with Agent Jinn but spotted another familiar face that she’d missed during the ceremony. Detective Phasma caught her eyes, and how her boys were leaving and looking dejected, and came to keep her company.

“I got here a little late,” Phasma said, filling the chair beside her. She didn’t look as tall as before, but she still looked imposing to Rey. “How was it?”

Rey looked distantly at the trees again, imagining children there instead. “It was long and sad. But Kylo did a good job. He practiced what he was going to say at the hotel a lot before we came. That got a little annoying. Am I going to be on television too?”

Rey knew the answer but wanted to make sure that Agent Jinn had told her the truth too. He’d said that she’d be on television, but they wouldn’t say who she was. If anyone asked, she was just Kylo’s sister. She hated that part the most, but knew it was for the best.

“Only as part of the crowd. People will figure it out, but we won’t say anything. When you’re eighteen you can decide that part for yourself.” Phasma seemed look a bit angry at the whole thing and Rey quirked her head, asking why. “I disagreed with George on letting you be here. There are still too many people looking into this. George…sometimes he lets his feelings for you two confuse him about what’s important.”

“Do you talk about us a lot?” The words made Rey feel both good and worried. “About the case? Kylo talks about it a lot.”

Scratching her eyebrow, Phasma leaned towards her. “I took a step back from your lives for a reason. George…he worked longer on the case and took every death personally. Seeing you two grow up is a chance for him to not live all of those deaths everyday. We talk about that, whenever we run into each other at one of these things. And I really disagree with him letting Kylo still live in the fantasy world that he’ll be able to join the FBI.”

Rey swallowed and nodded. But Kylo could do anything that he put his mind to. He was going to do it; he had to do it. “But he really wants to.”

Phasma shook her head. “Then he should focus on not arguing with anyone who gets under his skin.”

That part Rey could agree with. Rey asked a few more questions about California, trying to put Kylo out of her mind. She asked Phasma about working for the police for so long and how many kids she had saved. Phasma seemed to get kinder with every question, but probably knew that Rey was just pretending.

Finally, Agent Jinn stood next to her and she looked up and smiled.

“Can we finish that conversation that we started?” He was calm and soft again, taking her hand.

She asked if Kylo was going to be in trouble and he shook his head. She asked who the man in brown was and he said that he was going to find out. The police were going to ask him a few questions and make sure he wouldn’t bother Kylo again.

“That would probably be good,” Rey nodded. “Agent Jinn?”

“Yes, Rey?”

“Can you show me where my parents are. My real ones? Where they’re buried?”

 

-=-

 

It was a big cemetery, but Agent Jinn knew the way. She thought it was strange that he would know the path so well.

Still, there they were. Two headstones, with her real last name on it.

“When we dug deeper, we found out more and more about them,” he said, putting his hands on her shoulders. She couldn’t figure out why she wasn’t crying. She should be more sad. But she wasn’t. She needed to know the story; maybe that would help her imagine. “It looks like he was looking around homeless shelters for pregnant couples. He looked like he belonged there and always checked in under a different name. Then he found them. They were young, only eighteen and nineteen with nowhere to go and no one to turn to.

“He paid for you to be born in a hospital. That’s how we found the records. But he didn’t pay for a long enough stay and knew they would come back to him, looking for money. It wasn’t easy to figure out who they were, but we had a woman who had just given birth who was dead, along with her partner. I’m very sorry that you never got to know them, Rey. I’m very sorry that you were brought into a world through something like this.” Agent Jinn’s hands tightened on her shoulders.

But all she could think about were that her parents died at the same age that Kylo and Poe were right then. They would argue about silly things, but would also talk about them afterwards. They went out, but never got into trouble. They had a nice house to live in and they didn’t have a kid of their own, but they had her.

That thought made her lip tremble. “Who put up the gravestones?”

She’d seen where grandpa was buried and remembered Leia talking to grandma about how much it cost.

“I paid for them because I knew that one day, you’d like to see them. And know their story.” Agent Jinn touched the top of her head and she nodded. Maybe Phasma was right and he was taking on too much of their world.

“But why? I thought you liked Kylo more?”

He shook his head. “There’s space for the both of you in my heart. I may talk to him more, but seeing you grow up means more to me. He’s going to have many more troubles in the future. You’re going to have to be strong for him, but also remember that you have your own life and story to write. It started here, but didn’t end here. As long as you don’t forget about yourself, I think you can love Kylo and have your own life. And I’ll be there to help you both as long as I can.”

She managed to nod and then quietly asked to go back to the hotel. The boys were probably hungry.

 

-=-

 

Rey liked their apartment. It was perfect for them and she had her own room. She was excited to decorate it as all of the boxes were being brought it. She spun, looking up at the ceiling. The person that used to live there had put up stars there. She’d always have light when she was staying there.

Dad knocked on the frame of her door and she turned and grinned, watching him put down a box that was labelled kitchen in Kylo’s angry writing. “There are glow-in-the dark stars here! I won’t need a nightlight!”

Han leaned against the door and gave her a long look, smiling at her joy. “So you’ve already decided that you get this room? You didn’t talk to the boys?”

She shook her head. “I got to pick it when we looked at it last month, dad.”

Crossing his arms, Han stepped into the empty room. The furniture delivery would be there in a few hours. But it was late and Kylo was outside yelling at them on his phone. “Well, if I remember correctly, I wasn’t allowed to come and look at apartments. Even though I’ll be paying for it.”

“But this one is really close to campus. They didn’t want to stay in the dorms like Hux. Kylo says that there are too many parties there and it always smells.” She left out the part how Hux had warned Kylo that not too many people would be happy having a couple like Poe and Kylo living there.

Kylo was beginning to understand all of the pressure he was putting on everyone. Poe’s grades weren’t as good as his and he felt awful about that, worried that they wouldn’t get into the same school and felt that he disappointed Kylo by not being smart enough. Kylo said that he’d never feel that way about him, about anything; he was good at enough subjects that he could make a career out of them. Mom and dad were also concerned that they’d have to send Rey on a plane to somewhere far away. That’s when she was reminded of what Agent Jinn had said and knew that they were more worried about him being too far away from them. It would be hard to get to him if something happened if he was on the other side of the country. Hux said that where he went was good enough for what Kylo wanted to study and that he also wanted to spend more time with him, since Paige went to a dance academy on the other side of the state. So Kylo compromised with everyone. And now he was at a university only three hours away with his best friend, his boyfriend, and she had a room in their apartment.

“Before you go losing yourself in the stars, we need to talk again about what we talked about before.” Dad wasn’t letting it go and Rey pouted.

Letting her shoulders shake, she tried not to stomp her foot. All summer they’d been telling her the same thing. She guessed it was her turn to compromise. “I can’t stay here the first month. So they can get settled in. And then just once a month, until they’re settled in. What does settled in even mean, dad?”

He sighed and walked over to the windowsill, sitting down and tapping on it for her to join him. She was still frowning as she went to sit beside him.

“It means that they’re not in high school anymore and won’t be living at our house with closed doors anymore. College is something different and can really be challenging.” He was looking out the window, at the other buildings around them. They were on the first floor. Kylo wanted something up higher, so no one could climb onto the balcony, but this was closest to campus with the best rent. “And I’m not just talking about school.”

Dad hadn’t missed their arguments, but he usually didn’t see how they acted afterwards. How Poe would explain why he had been angry and Kylo would do the same. She heard familiar words, words from Maz, in their conversations. Maz probably hadn’t told them how to smile or hold one another afterwards until they fell asleep, though.

“But they’ve been together for three years? How’s that going to be hard?”

Dad shrugged. “People change when they grow up. We love them both and it would be nice that they stayed together, but sometimes we don’t always get what we want.”

Rey rolled her eyes. “They’re in love, Han.”

He looked at her with a frown. “Don’t you start calling me that.”

She stuck her tongue at him.

They spent the rest of the day unpacking. And Kylo had calmed down enough by the time the furniture got there that it was actually not as stressful as they had all thought.

And the first thing that Kylo put up on the fridge, with a magnet from the FBI headquarters, was his checklist.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Usual warnings: mentions of past rape, murder and abuse, post-trauma, and boys kissing. 
> 
> This chapter could have included more things but it's long enough and only a little disjointed. Thanks to everyone still reading and commenting. The next chapter is nearly done too so it will probably be up sometime over the weekend. I might wait with Chapter 27 because I'd like to make a better dent in Chapter 28 (or change it entirely). 
> 
> Much love to you all!


	26. Chapter 26

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The troubles in the boys' relationship come to an unexpected head; Rey turns eleven and feels like the world is ending.
> 
> The second-last Poe/Kylo chapter. 
> 
> See the Chapter notes for warnings.

 

“So, are we going to talk about it?”

Kylo could only look at his feet in the basement, letting his unshed tears thicken in his chest. “How I fucked up your life?”

Poe’s frown deepened as he shifted on the bed he’d been using the last few weeks of school. He’d hardly moved anything in, other than a duffle bag of clothes. It was like he was aching to leave, to be rid of him. He’d still smile and kiss him, hug him and say that he loved him, but his eyes were sad when he didn’t think that anyone was looking. “Yeah.”

Staring off into nothing, Kylo didn’t know what to say. An uncomfortable distance had started to grow between them since Kylo did what he thought he had to do. Kylo had hated every second of it and they’d avoided the conversation in favour of not knowing. Now it was decided: Poe had to go to Florida and might not be coming back. His arm had healed but the ghost break remained.

“I don’t know what to say.” His eyes flicked up as Poe folded his arms. “You were mad and I didn’t know why. Then I freaked out about what you said. I fucked up a lot that night.”

Sighing, Poe flopped down on the bed. He rubbed his eyes. “Okay, okay. We’ve already established that it’s all my fault. About the only people that don’t think that are your parents and they hate me.”

“They don’t hate you,” he answered quickly and took a cautious step towards the bed. “And if I were normal, you wouldn’t have had a reason to be mad.”

Poe was quiet but didn’t pull away when Kylo reached to take his hand. He slowly moved closer, trying to see his face. The bruise was gone, but like his arm, he still felt the echo. But Poe just stared up at the ceiling.

“Do you even want to come back?” The question had been pressing on him all evening. Maybe it was better not to know that either.

Finally sitting up, Poe took both of his hands. Kylo willed himself not to feel hope. He was steadying himself to go numb, retreat back into his head and never feel anything close to hope again.

“Yeah, but…” Poe paused and shook his head. “We have to promise to talk about these things more. Not just me talking, but you talking too. I can’t go around being afraid of you, what you can do when you get that angry. If I come back, I’ll only have you.”

He’d let him burrow under his skin to a point that there was no going back. It hurt more to think about losing him than to restrain himself from fracturing in the future. He needed to think more, to be smarter with his rage even though it was the hardest emotion to control.

He had to make this promise and keep it.

 

-=-

 

“So, are we going to talk about it?”

Kylo lifted his head to snap at him. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

They were on the plane home from Florida. It had been a confusing and long, long month that should have made them stronger and had up until last night. He’d been able to make it through the entire visit not starting or getting into any real fights, even though he really wanted to. He took many long walks, coming back to Poe’s mother’s guesthouse and unleashing his frustrations on Poe. But that got them talking about what it meant to be together, forcing Kylo to again deal with things that he was being ignorant about. They liked each other, loved each other, but could disagree about things. Kylo didn’t want to think about that; he just wanted Poe to listen to him and not make him think about the other side of things. But he had to. That’s what normal people did.

“Ky, come on.” Poe touched his hand and he flinched away, looking out the window and hoping that they took off soon so he could go home and hide. “You didn’t hurt me last night. It’ll be better next time when we’re both ready. When you’re ready.”

He was right and the thought made Kylo’s hands tense. After weeks of teasing from various cousins and relatives, who had no idea who he was or how he felt about sex, Kylo had asked Poe if they could have sex, real sex. Not just handjobs or blowjobs, but penetration. Poe had made a face at Kylo’s very unromantic phrasing and then asked if he was really ready. It had been a thought that had twisted in Kylo’s chest for the last half a year as their physical relationship deepened. But after the hundredth time of being asked by grating strangers about how often they fucked, he wanted to tie them together permanently.

And he couldn’t.

He had made a decision not out of love, but out of frustration. His hatred of himself surfaced again at the thought. When they had prepared and had Kylo had thought his head was clear enough, after tender kisses and careful touches, he met Poe’s eyes and tried to enter him. But the moment Poe gasped, as he was hardly inside him, he was torn back to his own assault and how it still tormented him. He was seven years old, being raped and losing his innocence on a disgusting couch to a specter of death. He froze and couldn’t breathe, his heart demanding to be let out of his chest through his throat. It took hours to calm down and he wept until he couldn’t speak. They were both exhausted by the time they fell asleep and had to fly the next morning.

“What if I do hurt you next time?” Kylo asked, rubbing his knuckle against the cool glass beside him.

“You won’t. We’ll make sure you won’t. Or make sure that it hurts less than it should.” Poe again reached for his other hand and Kylo didn’t pull away this time. “We’ve got to talk about this, okay?”

He pulled his sweater over his mouth and shook his head.

“Fine, whatever.” Poe mumbled, turning away from him. “I still love you but if you want me to ignore you, I can do that too.”

Kylo didn’t even last a week before he apologized and needed to spill his feelings to him, feeling like he lost a limb in his silence.

 

-=-

 

“So, are we going to talk about it?”

Poe’s voice was still dejected, his eyes still down. He’d been crying for a half an hour almost and it made Kylo ache, being so far away. He’d been fine before, when Rey was there. They’d told him about going skiing the previous weekend. But then, when Rey went to bed after blowing him a dozen kisses, Poe just broke down. He’d only been gone for three weeks; they were halfway done being apart. He just had to make it three more weeks.

Sitting up on Agent Jinn’s guest bed, Kylo frowned at the computer screen. “You’re allowed to miss me. You know that.”

“Yeah, but you’re just so far away. I’m getting so much shit at school because everyone knows that you’re out of town. Whoever keeps writing ‘homo’ on my locker needs to learn more insults.” At least he smirked at the last part. “But yeah, I’ve made up my mind. If we get into the same school, I’m going with you to college. I’ll go nuts if we’re this far apart for so long.”

Kylo didn’t understand why such simple words could bring him so much joy. “That’s…that’s fantastic.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I need you too.” Kylo meant it. Some days he doubted his feelings but the plan in his head included Poe and Rey. When they were older and proved to Leia that they could take care of Rey long term, she’d move in with them and not just stay there when she was able to. “We’ll talk about it more when I get home. Just…don’t be too sad. Did Rey really like skiing?”

He changed the subject to get away from his own sadness. The first week in Virginia had been rough. Agent Jinn said he had full run of the house, but Kylo mostly kept to the guestroom. When they ate dinner, Kylo didn’t know what to talk about. The house was big and nicely decorated; there were antique weapons and spears on the walls, African masks, and Asian statues. But Agent Jinn was alone there. Kylo finally got the courage to ask about his wife and Agent Jinn explained how his wife had left him a year ago. When Kylo did the math, he asked why he didn’t tell him before. _Well, you didn’t ask_ , Jinn had said before winking at him and taking a drink. That was the lesson for that night. And there were many more lessons after that: how to talk to people and make sure that they’re comfortable so that they’ll answer your questions, how to analyze long reports and formulate them the proper way. Kylo really wanted to do the weapons training but that wouldn’t be until week five, but only if he could complete a safety exam. Even then, it was only to do test shooting.

“Oh yeah, she fucking loved it. You can see it in the pictures I sent you.” Poe was grinning and launched into a story about how many times he had fallen and how he was covered in bruises because of something fun rather than because of punishment. How Rey hadn’t fallen once and then on the drive home told him exactly how many times he’d fallen. “I just gave up. I’m not good at rich, white people sports. Han told me about some rowing club he used to belong to and I was like ‘you row boats for fun? No, you row boats to get away from fucking gators.’ And he laughed so hard that he knocked over his glass.”

“Get him to show you the pictures of it.” Kylo smiled. “They kicked him off after a week.”

“What, really?”

“Yeah.” Kylo thought again about the lessons from Agent Jinn. “What’s another white people thing you haven’t done?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never ridden a horse. I’ve never gone to Italy just to wander around in white shorts and complain about how no one speaks English.” Poe shifted, to rest on his elbows. He was in his room and not the basement. It should have annoyed Kylo but it didn’t. “It’s actually really weird living here without you. Mom and dad asked again if I wanted a car so I didn’t have to keep borrowing yours and I was like ‘nah, it’s fine.’ And mom still left the used car guide on my bed with a couple of cars circled.”

“They’re just trying to be nice. They do shit like this. They think they know what you want and don’t really think.” Kylo answered, shaking his head.

Poe nodded. “Yeah, my mom is worried that I’m going to forget what it’s like to have nothing. Like, yeah mom, I’m going to forget sleeping in a car for half a year because someone else is going to pay for my college. Her new husband is loaded so I don’t know why she needs to bitch at me.”

Kylo had managed to get to some of the real problems; it wasn’t just that Poe missed him, but there were other people pressuring him. And Kylo knew that he was one of him. Until Poe had snapped at him a couple of weeks ago, he wasn’t really aware of how critical he was being of his schoolwork. He had to go to college with him. He needed better SAT scores when he retook the exam soon.

Nodding, Kylo checked the time on his phone. He’d put a picture of Poe and Rey at the ski hill as his background.

“I should go to bed. I have to be there at 6 a.m. tomorrow and it takes forever to get there.” It was just after ten but it would take him at least an hour to fall asleep. “Tell Rey I love her again for me and tell her how much I miss her too.”

Poe kissed the palm of his hand and held it up to the camera. “Will do. We’ll talk tomorrow and I’ll try not to cry the entire time. Love you.”

The words always felt real coming from Poe but whenever he said them in reply, he knew that his feelings were still coming together. “Love you too.”

He clicked off the call and closed his laptop, resting against his head against the case. He wished that Agent Jinn was there, but he was away for a week. The agent that Kylo was working with while he was away had far less patience with him. He’d lost some important document and had spent all afternoon trying to find it. When he did, he was only reminded of how he’d messed up rather than how he’d managed to succeed despite his own stupidity.

Grumbling, he went downstairs to make sure that he’d cleaned up the kitchen correctly. He wouldn’t be able to sleep if he thought he’d left a mess in that house and Rey wasn’t there to clean up after him.

 

-=-

 

“So, are we going to talk about it?”

Kylo opened his eyes as he caught the anger in Poe’s tone. He sat up on the couch, their couch, and shrugged. “Talk about what?”

Poe’s eyes filled with rage. “How you were following me with my friends when I was out tonight.”

He wore his guilt on his face, no matter how hard he tried to stay blank. He knew it because Poe tossed up his hands and started pacing the living room. It was 1 a.m. Poe had said he’d be home at eleven. Kylo had went to find him at quarter after, not trusting him to text. He’d managed to get back before him, but just barely.

“You can’t fucking _stalk_ me when I’m not in the apartment!”

“I was just looking for you.” He kept his voice level, not getting drawn into another argument. In the six months that they’d been living together, this had been the first time that he’d been caught.

“Then why didn’t you just come up and say ‘Oh, hi, I’m his dumbass boyfriend who refuses to meet you and keeps cancelling every time we try to hangout?’ Or ‘Gee, I’m really sorry for following you around campus last month?’” Poe’s voice descended further into anger. “Yeah, Kylo, they saw you. You can’t _stalk_ my labmates.”

“I was…” he trailed off when he realized his chest was tightening. “I want to make sure that they’re safe for you.”

Poe wiped at his eyes and stopped pacing. “Can you just stop with that? Or at least _talk_ about why you think people are following us? Or out to get us? If you met my friends rather than going all covert ops, then you’d know that they were safe.”

“I’m not jealous,” he blurted out. “I just want to make sure that they’re safe.”

“Did I _say_ that you were jealous? Don’t put words in my mouth.” Poe glared and then exhaled. “It’s so hard to be mad at you when I know that there’s something going on in your head and a good reason for it. Please talk about that the next time we’re in therapy and then we can keep figuring it out. But I need time too, Ky. Time by myself.”

Despite his stubbornness, Kylo nodded. He just wanted to keep them safe and didn’t understand why he was mad on one level, but beneath that he knew how horrible it was to feel the endless pain of being followed.

Standing, Kylo reached for him. And like he wanted him to, Poe folded into his arms.

 

-=-

 

“So, are we going to talk about it?”

Kylo forced himself to wake up at the sound of Poe’s voice and the sound of meowing on his chest.

“What?” He squinted, shaking his head. “I got you a cat. You always wanted a cat.”

Poe sat up, scooping the tiny orange kitten against his chest from where it had been sleeping between them. It meowed, squirming in his hands. “Yeah, yeah I did. But why you got me a cat, can we talk about that?”

He just wanted to sleep again and put his head down. “I forget.”

“Ky? Come on. We had a fight and you _left_. It scared the shit out of me. You left for hours and I couldn’t find you. I was scared. You scared me. You really did. And this cat is cute as fuck but don’t ever do that to me again.” Poe was shirtless, in their bed, and angry with him.

And he deserved to be. At the height of his anger last evening, when they had been fighting about how Kylo didn’t want to go home that weekend and Poe did, Kylo had just left. He was at a breaking point and just needed to breathe, to not talk about feelings anymore.

He didn’t think he was gone that long, but found a tiny, cold, wet, and lost kitten in the gutter. He searched for the mother in a panic, up and down the alleys and streets until the sun was starting to come up. It was only then that he realized that he’d left his phone at home and had to come back.

“We can go to the pet store today, get him what he needs. He can’t just have milk.” He mumbled, sitting up too. He was still cold. Poe had been in the bed but hadn’t held him that night. “Take him to the vet too.”

“You’re changing the subject. Don’t leave an argument, we promised that. Please. Please don’t do that to me again.” His eyes were so pleading in that moment and Kylo dared to reach out his hand, to brush down his chest. It was firm and smooth and reminded him of why he came back.

“I won’t run again. I’ll talk more. Please stay with me.” His hand drifted up, cupping his face. “No matter how many times I fuck up, please stay.”

Poe’s eyes were firm but still shifted, leaning into his hand. “Just don’t bring home any more stray cats. Okay?”

Kylo reached out his hand to try to pet the kitten and it bit him hard on the finger.

He deserved it.

 

-=-

 

“So, are we going to talk about it?”

They were both fixing their pants, sweaty and unsteady in the private washroom of Han’s new office.

“What?” Kylo asked, moving to wash his hands again.

“Ky,” Poe started, leaning against him. They both still smelt like sex. “That was amazing.”

Kylo could actually meet his own eyes in the mirror as he grinned. “It actually was.”

Spring break that year had meant time off, celebrating his twentieth birthday and Rey’s tenth; but it also meant being forced to go to Han’s boss’s retirement party. His father would be president of the firm now, ‘hanging on’ for a few more years before he retired. Kylo felt terrified at the thought of his father even thinking of retiring and didn’t admit it to anyone. The contemplation had been on his mind the entire night as the office building was overwhelmed with cooperate slime and glitz. A terrible band was playing. Rey was at a sleepover at Finn’s and he was glad that she wasn’t there. He’d had a sip of champagne and then handed his glass to Poe who grinned wildly, overjoyed at just being there.

As the speeches wore on, he saw how Poe was sitting. He was leaning back in his chair, arms resting behind his head; there was none of the usual tension in his shoulders. He looked more comfortable around his parents, more at ease than he’d ever looked before. Even with the odd looks from the others at the table, he was there and enjoying himself.

He hadn’t bothered with a tie, but the shirt was new. The black button-up shirt hugged his body in a way that had made Kylo uncomfortable.

When he leaned over to whisper something to him, during another dull speech about Han’s dumb boss, he finally smelled him. Whatever cologne he was wearing that night spiked a type of arousal that Kylo hadn’t felt before, or had denied himself from realizing. He was used to waking up with an erection at this point and being brought to excitement through touching, but the way Poe looked and smelled that night twisted something within him. His hair hung perfectly and the festive, flashing lighting showed off the angles of his face. Then he grinned at him and grabbed his leg.

Kylo wasn’t good at being turned on in public.

So they slipped away, using the key that Han had giving him earlier because _you don’t want to be here, I don’t want to be here. If it gets too boring, just go sit in there for a while and don’t make an ass of yourself. There’s whisky in the bottom drawer._

They’d had sex before, but not like this. Sneaking away and making out would have been fine but the hair on the back of his neck told him that he wanted more. He was shaking in a different way when they locked the door to the washroom. He had been too keyed up by how Poe looked and smelled, how he moved and how he looked at him. His wild eyes fed into his need. He hadn’t even stopped to care about _why_ Poe had lube in his back pocket. He knew he’d get some wild story later.

The normal discomfort that he usually felt as they whispered endearments and made sure that they both were ready faded into a white noise of getting _there_.

And when he was, when he was inside him, on the counter of his father’s office washroom, he broke another thing inside of him that he thought was already in shambles.

“Hey,” he said, gripping Poe by the hips to rest his forehead against his. He couldn’t speak for a moment, still absorbed in what was happening in his shaking emotions. “I love you.”

For the first time in four years, the words held true meaning. He’d finally figured it out. The arguing, the love-making, his constant panic about being followed or left alone, it was all tied into not really understanding how he really felt. It shone around them in a glistening light that he couldn’t blink away. His heart was tied to this man and he didn’t know how to disentangle it. And the thought of that made him quiver and tears stung his eyes as his head dropped onto Poe’s shoulder.

“Hey, Ky, Ky, it’s okay. I love you too. I love you so much.” Poe lifted his head, kissing him and then holding his face in place. “Thanks for…catching up with me on that.”

He licked his lips and nodded. “We should…probably get back out there.”

Poe dried the tears from his eyes, wiping at them with shaking hands, and then he nodded too.

He could still smell Poe’s cologne on his skin as they sat down at the head table.

“That took a while,” Leia leaned over and said, raising her eyebrows as they both tried and failed to discreetly fix their hair. “Boys, the bottle is all yours. We’ve got the car booked tonight.”

Kylo saw how full both of their glasses were. The wine was expensive, but his mind flicked to another source of love. Someone would need to pick up Rey the next morning. She couldn’t take a fucking car back to her house like some rich idiot; that’s how she’d get teased even more. So he slid the bottle over to Poe who grinned and leaned over to openly kiss him in front of his parents and the other board members at the table. And Kylo leaned into it, letting the feeling from before take hold again. He wanted it to burrow into his heart and kill the rest of the darkness. Had he really been lying the last four years every time that he said he loved him? Why was he only feeling it now?

The car home arrived at 1 a.m. and he was half-carrying Poe out to it. Han and Leia were both stumbling and he told them that he would get Rey the next morning. He could go and get her right then, but it was too late to wake her up and take her.

Poe was asleep against his arm almost instantly when they climbed into the back seat. His father was drunkenly telling the driver how to get home and his mother was on the other side of him, humming something to herself. But he was so happy in that moment that he couldn’t let any of that bring him down.

“Is he okay?” Leia leaned over and whispered, too loudly to be quiet.

He shrugged. “He’ll get some water and I’ll make sure that this doesn’t happen again. We don’t get drunk that often, mom.”

“I know, sweetheart. You’re both more responsible than that.”

There had only been a few occasions when they’d stumbled home from a party that Poe had dragged him to. But at least now Kylo knew who his friends were and only followed them now and again.

He pressed a kiss against Poe’s sweaty forehead and smiled at the dull sound that he made in the back of his throat. His mother caught the look and reached for his other hand. Still not down from his high, he squeezed it in response. He was also exhausted and rested his head against Poe’s, hoping to sleep for the forty-five minute drive home. It would probably take an hour. He could probably sleep in that time. He closed his eyes and lingered in the warm waves of pleasure and the absence of hurt.

“I love you, Ben.”

“Love you too, mom,” he mumbled, starting to drift off to sleep.

And it was only when he was at home in their house, forcing Poe to drink more water and not get sick and to stop singing some song that he suddenly found hilarious, that he realized it was the first time in probably thirteen years that he said that to his mother and meant it.

 

-=-

 

They were running late.

Mostly because Kylo didn’t want to go.

He was re-reading his B+ essay— _really_ Professor Ackbar just a B+?—and watching Poe get ready. He’d changed his shirt from one that Kylo disliked to another, better one. It set off his arms and was a v-neck rather than the previous turtleneck. He gave him one last annoyed look and Kylo pretended that he hadn’t been watching him move around the kitchen, gathering up what they were taking with them. But Poe had caught him and Kylo focused his eyes again on why he’d only got a B+ on his anthropology essay.

“Ky, come on.” Poe nudged him with his foot. “It’s your twenty-first birthday. We can’t just stay here and get drunk. And Paige will be there. Come on.”

He dragged out the last syllable until Kylo finally smiled. It was his birthday and the start of spring break. “What could go wrong?”

Poe flopped down next to him on the couch, gripping his knee. He ran his hand up his thigh and smiled, brightly, knowing that it would draw Kylo in to kiss him. It felt like it always felt when their lips met; all of the other problems were washed away and they both were home in their bubble.

But that bubble had been close to bursting many times the last nearly five years.

At least they were honest with each other about their weakest moments.

He leaned forward, deepening the kiss at the thought of all of his mistakes in his relationship. He really took all of the arguments on as his own. Working through the physical issues hadn’t been easy either; hell, those were the hardest. Words he could figure out and back them up with facts; how he reacted in intimate situations had only slowly become more consistent. He was always fighting against himself with those feelings. Being bigger and stronger didn’t mean that he still didn’t feel like a sixteen year old, fumbling on his bed. But he was at least more comfortable with almost everything that they did now. Almost everything.

There were always other things that got in the way. He was too focused on school and Poe blew off too many classes.

Pushing back, Poe shook his head. “Save that energy for later okay? Let’s go hang out. We never just hang out with people. I’ve already fed the cat. Just put on your coat and let’s go.”

He rolled his eyes. Fine. It was his birthday, after all.

Poe was happily holding his hand on the walk over, trying to get him out of his dull mood. March was still March, no matter where in the state he was. Hux had moved off campus a year ago, getting an apartment not far from them. It was mostly college students in their area, but Kylo still eyed anyone that gave them a dirty look whenever they went out openly in their relationship. He was also looking for anyone lurking that might be familiar; he’d made notes of anyone who might be following them. There was someone, despite how Poe would say that he was just inventing struggles because of stress. Even if he never saw the face of who he _knew_ was following them, it was the people he actually saw that upset him more.

It was something that Poe pinned to his identity, but the fact that he didn’t want to make who he was in a relationship with part of who existence was a problem for everyone but them. They’d had long talks about it; he hated any term that anyone tried to paint him with. His psych course in first year had been beyond frustrating when it came to that. There was always someone on campus that would spot them having a private moment, either in the library or on quad when they were both pretending that they were alone, and ask them one of two things: join our group, or stop what they were doing because it was wrong. Poe understood him and wanted to be with him; Kylo had comprehended that since he was sixteen and accidentally got a boyfriend who loved him more than he deserved. Whatever their sex life looked like was really their own and no one else’s.

Even Rey got it and she was eleven, aside from the physical details of it; the emotional parts she knew. He couldn’t deny her that. And even though she was getting increasingly frustrated, he hoped that she still understood. She had to; she loved them. That when they came home for a weekend and just wanted to sleep, it was because the previous week had been another week of understanding how far they could push themselves until Kylo couldn’t draw the line between pleasure and hurt and lost himself. How they went quiet from over communicating.

That was a hard lesson that they learnt during their first time in Florida. No one got off that night because no one talked. It had been too much teenage anxiety and not being able to admit that he wasn’t ready to fully confront his pain. Seventeen-year-old Kylo wasn’t any smarter than any other version of himself. Kylo wanted to make Poe happy and was still filled with so much apprehension about what they were doing and if it would hurt. No one was relaxed. Both of them wanted to make the other one happy and it ended up being a disaster.

He had blacked out everything, removing it from his mind until he needed to agonize about it. Whenever he touched on the physical memories from that night, he just pictured a building imploding and ignoring how his hands still wanted to shake from those few minutes and then hours of crying. When they finally talked about it, they decided that talking wasn’t so embarrassing. He had missed Poe’s kisses and favour for almost a week and was easily drawn into starting over and being clothed and holding one another on his family’s couch until Rey came and hit them with a pillow and he realized that he was forgetting about how she felt again.

But after five years, he was almost close to liking sex and enjoyed being in love. It the heated and desperate moments, when everything aligned and his mind was in the right place, he enjoyed sex because it was something that they shared together. It was another workout that left another person gasping beneath him, telling him how much he loved him. Yet, there were still too many times that he’d have to pull back, to make it stop. He didn’t want to call them panic attacks anymore, but they were.

Still, Poe wanted to be with him. He’d hold him in the shower after, letting him whimper and be pathetic and still not say that he was that.

But sex was the least of his problems. Or at least he wanted it to be.

They’d be celebrating Rey’s birthday the next day. With midterms this last week, they couldn’t go home this year; the timing was off. He’d seen Poe’s eyes the weeks leading up the exams; he’d just wanted to get out of there and had quietly punished him for having to put in too much work by making more bland food together than they usually did. Neither of them was as good at cooking as Rey, when she was there. But she hadn’t been there in so long that the tension in his neck was starting to increase. He’d tried texting with her to understand what was going on but she’d end up not telling him everything.

Mom and dad would have lunch with them tomorrow and drop Rey off for the rest of the weekend, including the holiday Monday for her. With how Rey was doing in school, Han had emphasized that staying longer wouldn’t be good. Her break had been earlier and they had missed it and she had been upset about it; he knew that she was and he had apologized and made promises that he was probably going to screw up. Leia and Han had sent him her last report card and it showed a real decline; he didn’t tell her that he’d seen it and had read her lies about her grades. So Kylo had agreed with Han but hadn’t told Rey yet that they had more free time that they couldn’t spend together. She would be mad, but she was getting increasingly agitated with a lot lately. Most of it was his fault.

His grades were good, but he was also succeeding in displeasing everyone who he cared about.

“Feeling better? Feeling excited?” Poe was still in a good mood still and Kylo managed a nod before they went inside the apartment building. He noticed how the outer door didn’t close behind them and instinctively reached out and shut it hard behind them.

He had seen too many people following them lately to take chances.

Paige opened the door with a bright grin that Kylo hadn’t realized he’d missed. “Hey, welcome to spring break!” She wrapped her thin but strong arms around his neck. “Happy birthday, Kylo! How are you guys?”

“Happy that midterms are over,” he mumbled into her hair. It smelled like lilacs and her makeup had been perfect in the brief flash he’d seen of her face. But she still looked too thin. “It’s good to see you.”

Paige’s grin brightened, stepping back. Not seeing her for half a year vanished in the depth of her dimples. “God, Kylo. Look at those arms.” She turned her attention to his companion. “Do you really let him work out _this_ much?”

Poe’s hand was on his back, lurking in the doorway of Hux’s apartment. “I can’t stop him. I’ve tried. But hey, I like it too so maybe I don’t try that hard.”

Paige pulled Poe into a hug and Kylo finally found his way into the apartment. It really hadn’t been his idea to go over there to see Paige and Hux for his birthday. To him, celebrating now should be more private. After the trip home that coincided with his last birthday, he wanted more of those types of moments. It was always in his head how perfect it felt. That was one of the few times he didn’t want to pull away and the bubbles of realizing what love actually was were still floating in his chest on good days. At his parents’, Rey had been so happy to turn ten. She was finally almost a teenager. They bought her a new phone, even though she had just got one for Christmas. His parents had looked annoyed at them, but she loved it because it was pink and not silver. Poe had been listening more to her than he had; Rose had a pink phone and she wanted one too.

Yet with spring break, having time off was needed but also endless. He could catch up on readings, catch up on his thoughts, but would end up having too little too do. The promise of alcohol, which he had bought, wasn’t really something he wanted at that point.

But that afternoon, meeting Poe at home for lunch before he forced him to go somewhere that he didn’t need cook, he saw in the other man’s eyes that he needed some form of break. He made him eat a brownie, singing him happy birthday in Spanish in the corner of the café until he relented and said that they would go. His reluctance later on had almost forced Poe to do it again. And he would have, if he had given him five more minutes.

Those small moments were layered upon how often they had sex. Clothed or unclothed, he loved the person he was with. He drove him crazy, but he knew he did the same to Poe. This was a storm that he could weather the rest of his life as long as Rey found someone to make her just as happy. If she didn’t, then he’d have to put everything in jeopardy in his heart. To him, they were equal in his head; but his heart held other phantom fears. The fact that Poe was happy now with him, despite how often he’d put them through troubled times, was important; but Rey needed him too. He hoped that it would never come to that.

For Kylo, the last two and a half years, had been built on studying at first and had put their relationship second for too long. He thought that they were there for one reason, like with high school. He’d waited an extra year to make sure he had his grounding with him. He couldn’t take Rey, but he had Poe. He needed him to force him through these things.

The hurt in Poe’s eyes in not seeing Paige and even Hux for a low-key celebration of his stupid birthday made him again rethink how unfair his level of focus was yet again.

Steering away from the small talk in the hall, he found Hux on the couch in the living room. His friend smirked at him and stood.

“You cancel, and then uncancel,” Hux said, teasing him with his eyes. Thank God, he didn’t want a hug. Whatever cologne he was wearing was truly awful. “What the fuck, man?”

He shrugged, sitting down rather than greeting him properly. “I missed your girlfriend more than you, I guess.”

Hux rolled his eyes. “Come on, when was the last time we hung out? Christmas? When we were home?”

He exhaled, still reliving the hangover from the evening that he had spent with Hux. They texted all of the time and would forward papers to each other, proofreading their work. But time always got away from him, mostly because he let it happen. “Can I have a drink before I answer that?”

Hux raised his eyebrows and then grinned. “That’s why you’re here.”

Left alone, aside from the music from the stereo and the sound of Poe and Paige speaking in the hall, he sighed. He was tired of thinking about being too much.

Paige was grinning when the two of them came into the room. “You got him a cat? Why am I only hearing about a cat now?”

He let his head fall back and he squeezed his eyes shut. He could feel the annoying, yet wonderful, grin radiating off Poe’s face.

“We got into a fight, what, a year ago? Something like that. Ky just took off, left his phone, told me to fuck off. Thought I’d never see him again. He came home that night with this little orange kitten that he found on the street when he was out walking for five fucking hours. And, I’m really sorry now Ky, but he was just sobbing about this kitten. And said that it was for me and we needed to take care of it and to forgive him.” Poe sat down next to him and put his feet on the coffee table. At least he could afford socks without holes now. “He bit Ky the next morning and it stung, so I named him Bee.”

“I saved that cat and he fucking hates me,” he mumbled, feeling Poe’s hand squeeze his knee. He was deciding whether or not to get upset about himself for that night again when he shook out of it. “Can we get drunk now?”

 

-=-

 

Kylo stared at how Paige was perched on Hux’s lap, laughing at what they were both saying. It had been something stupid, but he’d missed most of the words. They’d only eaten small snacks that Paige had tried to make and he wanted to tell her his eleven year old could make better appetizers than she could, but let it go. There was more booze than food. He rarely got drunk for this reason, but for once he was letting his guard down. He didn’t hate getting drunk; he tolerated it. Poe didn’t want to end up like his dad so there were very few nights like this; the aftermath of the office party was something that Kylo would actually tease him about. But he could let go for a few hours. The week had worn him down to that. The alcohol was finally starting to blur his judgement when he grabbed Poe by the waist as he tried to move by him and pulled him onto his knees.

“Oh, hey, Ky, how are you doing?” Poe actually chuckled, leaning back into him. “Should we go home soon? If you’re getting huggy, then you’re drunk.”

He nuzzled the back of his neck, shaking his head. He wasn’t wearing that cologne tonight and just smelt like him. “No.”

Paige sat up, perching herself on Hux’s knees. She gave Kylo a long look and then turned to Poe. “We never get to see you guys like this. It’s nice. You’ve been together forever. You don’t have to be embarrassed in front of us.”

“Almost five years, shit. But hey, you guys are almost there too, right?” His hands tightened around Poe’s waist as he spoke and he felt another pair of hands join them. “Nah, it’s not that. I’m pretty open, but he’s…right? Kylo? You’re only all about me?”

“Yeah,” he answered, letting go of Poe’s hand to reach for his beer. “He’s worried I’m uncomfortable. And I’m not.”

He saw Hux’s eyes glide closed and then opened again as Paige handed him his beer. Hux sighed. “I couldn’t imagine not being able to hug and kiss her when I wanted. Well, when she’s around, but that’s _another_ problem. But you guys are solid and…fuck, where was I going with that?”

Kylo set his bottle down and pulled Poe closer, enjoying being open without starting to shake. He was protective and possessive on some days; their fight last month reminded him of that. But he was also withdrawn and cold at times; their fight two months ago also reminded him of that. But right now, he didn’t want a fight. He wanted to be like Hux and have the person he loved on his lap as they got drunk. Poe took another shot of tequila and then poured another into the same glass. He turned in his lap and held a shot glass up to him.

“When was the last time we got fucked up, Ky? If you’re feeling good, I’m all for this. But if you’re unsure, then we stop right now.” His eyes held mischief but also warning, wiggling as he turned. Kylo opened his mouth, making sure his feelings were showing in his eyes. He took the shot, swallowing and eyeing Poe as he leaned back to chase the burn with his beer. Poe was still looking down at him, making sure that he was okay. This was why he loved him; this was why he fell in love with him and then finally realized it. They could fight about everything, but it was only because they felt too much and wanted the other to be more okay than the other.

Paige giggled, watching them but not seeing the hidden tones. “You guys are so cute.”

“Ky will never admit he’s cute,” Poe teased, holding his eyes for a second too long before turning back towards her. “But he is. Bug him about it. He hates it. He’s too relaxed right now. Bug him now so his shoulders look bigger. Oh, or how he never skips leg day and then nags me about skipping leg day.”

“I’m relaxed because I’m happy, come on,” Kylo argued, sitting up, pulling Poe closer. He felt Poe’s hand tense on his because he felt that was half-hard and in front of other people. He slowly let his boyfriend go, recognizing how he didn’t want anything to make either of them awkward in front of friends who knew them too well, but still might not really understand. Poe shifted away, but remained on his knees. Still, to Kylo happy wasn’t the right word; less tight was more accurate. He finished his beer and tried to hand the empty bottle to Poe who looked at it like he’d given him a cut-off limb. Rolling his eyes at his refusal, he finally shrugged off the look. Like he usually did with bottles, and probably had with a severed arm, he tossed it in the corner.

He must have been drunk if he was trivializing his previous life. But he refused to go there at that moment and squeezed Poe lightly, hoping that he knew what he was thinking about in that moment.

Paige groaned and left Hux’s lap. “Bottles don’t go on the floor.”

Kylo actually chuckled, forcing a light tone. He was acting like he didn’t care, so they probably thought that he didn’t. “They do if I don’t pick them up.”

Still grumbling, Paige glared at them as she placed the bottle on the coffee table. Kylo could feel how she was looking at them and it was a combination of annoyance and delight. She sat down beside Hux and put her hand on his leg, turning back towards them. “We miss you guys. Stop cancelling so much, Kylo.”

He could feel Poe sigh and then he poked him. “Hey, what?”

Poe turned again and he just stared up at him. His eyes still held the boy he’d been when they first got together, but the changes since then hadn’t dampened whom he was. The strong jaw and honest and playful eyes were physical, but the emotions within were the ultimate attraction. Kylo had kept giving him a home and more reasons to be with him, but also many reasons to go. His hair had finally grown out of the awful haircut from last month. Kylo stroked his cheek and tilted his head, inviting him to kiss him with his eyes.

Poe smirked, daring him to tease him further, and kissed him on the edge of his mouth instead. “Okay, so the goal for tonight is to get Ky drunk, but also keep him happy. It’s been way too long since he’s flirted with me in front of other people. I can use this for blackmail tomorrow when he’s feeling shitty about it with his parents. Drinking game. Go, Paige. Go!”

Paige instantly jumped up and grinned. “Oh, yes! Oh, yes! Truth or dare! You either tell the truth or do the dare, or you take a shot. Something like that. And get off his lap. It won’t be fun if you don’t. For my own sick pleasure, maybe I can dare you two to make out.”

“No.” Poe’s voice was rarely serious with other people so the tone made Paige and Hux sit up. “We’re not doing that.”

Paige bit her lip. “Okay, sorry for teasing. I’m a little drunk.”

“Good. Don’t, I mean, you’re our friends but, don’t make us a spectacle. Okay?” Poe was serious and Kylo shut his eyes at the words. Respect. That’s what Maz and everyone else had pounded into them. They could still act like idiots and forget one another at times, but they would always be pulled down into that concept. They knew each other, inside and out. He shuddered and felt how much he’d been drinking hit his chest.

Still, Kylo exhaled with annoyance when Poe dropped off his lap to sit on the floor. Paige was scrolling through her phone and he exchanged a look with Hux, who told him in a short and quick shake of his head that this wouldn’t end well. Kylo just let the rising tension fall away; he was drunk and happy. And if Poe wanted him to flirt in the open, he had to do that.

Poe was still looking at him. “Is that okay?”

He smirked, not forcing it. “It’s fine. I’ll be gone sooner this way.”

“I don’t want you to be gone, but okay. I can take care of everything. And don’t feel bad about it because I want to.” Poe looked at him with concern for a moment before Kylo shook his head. Poe’s eyes wrinkled into a careful smile and then turned back to Paige. “Let’s go. Paige, truth or dare. Before we lose him.”

She looked at him with a long mouth before huffing. “Fine. Truth.”

“You hate that your dad made you go to dance school rather than here to do something normal.” Poe took the game straight to the point, but also opening himself up to the same. He opened them _both_ up to the same level of questions.

Hux held his breath and Paige narrowed her eyes. “Truth? Okay. I hated him at first. He was trying to break us up because, um, he’s white and it didn’t fit with the plan. And I’m not marrying someone I don’t know because one of dad’s business partners that he _used_ to know has a son who _might_ be good at business and not be a teacher. But then I sat down and talked with him about what I want and what we all want. He can’t Tiger Dad me into infinity. So, I go to dance school and will never be a professional dancer, but an instructor instead. And I still get to be with him as long as I keep going and might do a few auditions in New York. Happy?”

Poe’s eyes went wild at losing his own game. “Wait, do I do a shot when I get shot down?”

“Fuck yes, you do when you come after my girl like that,” Hux mumbled, taking a long drink from his beer bottle. “Do it.”

Poe shrugged and took another shot of the tequila that they had brought. At least they wouldn’t have to bring it home at this point. “Okay. So, is that a rule? If you’re a dick, you do a shot? Fuck, Hux and Ky are done for.”

Kylo laughed lightly, sipping at the new beer that he found near his hand. He didn’t ask anyone to bring it to him; it had just appeared.

Paige just nodded and kept going. “Hux, truth or dare.”

Rolling his eyes, Hux sighed. “Dare.”

“Lick my dance shoe.” Paige’s voice was flat and serious, meeting his eyes with a firm mouth.

His eyes darted to Kylo, who shrugged. There were so many worse things in the world. Then, he quirked his head. “Paige, do you mean the inside or the bottom?”

Hux sputtered into his beer. “Whose side are you on, Kylo?”

Paige just let her smile take over her face. “Oh, the inside. They’re in the bag, babe. Just pick one and lick it.”

Hux wasn’t moving. His face grew more and more red before he finally left his seat. Kylo could hear his footsteps marching down the hall to find the damned bag. He let himself smile at the sound and the question. His hand was ringing the top of his beer bottle, but he still felt Poe’s hand find his calf. His leg had been aching the last few weeks, some sort of muscle bruising. Every other day, he was at the campus gym. They’d learned that lesson hard during the six weeks that they lived together alone; if he didn’t have any physical release, he’d grow frustrated with small problems too quickly. When he messed up anything sexual, it just made it worse. Poe, already worn down by their hard high school romance—which neither one of them would admit had been fucking hard, wouldn’t back down from arguments and then try to understand how they both were thinking.

Despite the passion that took them at the height of the disagreements, it made Kylo think about how they had still talked through their problems the morning after, or on better days the afternoon after. But those talks were also on Poe’s initiative. Talking was the most important thing, but so was putting his body through hell. Kylo needed the gym at night, Poe needed it in the morning; it was decided, especially when Poe had a term when none of his courses started before eleven. Kylo would only want to stay in bed with him, losing his focus with trying to please him. Poe saying that he needed to go to the gym had kicked his ass out of bed so he could follow him to campus and get into the headspace for course work. Both had their concentrations were in other places with how to balance their classes until they found a routine that worked. And his tender thigh was probably going to be forgotten soon, like all of the fights that they had had over the years. It would disappear into muscle memory: gone but not forgotten.

Hux emerged with the ballet slipper and vigorously licked the inside and Kylo laughed, hard. The look on his face launched so many memories that still loitered in his mind from before and after. Hux, eating any vegetable when they were kids and gagging into his napkin. Hux, glaring at him in in the library when they’d reconnected again. Hux, meeting his eyes in his car before they left the vehicle at Mr Dameron’s…

“Okay, I did it. Good enough?” Hux had heard him laugh and sat down and met him with a determined glare. The shoe had dropped to the floor with a hard thump and Kylo sat up and sucked in a deep breath. “Truth or dare, Kylo.”

He shrugged. “Dare.” It was better to get whatever perverted thing he was thinking of for him over with.

Hux’s eyes ringed with menace. Oh _no_.

“Kylo, give your boyfriend what you have in your jacket pocket.”

He was reaching for a shot when two pairs of hands stopped him.

Hux still held his eyes as their drunken conversation from Christmas break rattled around in his brain. Poe had gone to his mother’s, back to Florida to see his little brothers. It had been their first Christmas apart in years and Han had produced a ‘very nice and very smooth’ bottle of brandy on Boxing Day. After everyone else had gone to bed and then, after two glasses, he swiftly went to bed and left them to it because _fuck being underage, you boys have it_. The entire dinner had been annoying, despite how good the food had tasted. It was Rey’s first time deciding every dish and she was so proud of what she had done that he felt rotten inside for not being able to appreciate it to its fullest. All he wanted to know was what Poe would have thought about it. Christmas Day and Christmas Eve had been mom and grandma’s; Boxing Day had been Rey’s. And his head was somewhere else.

Hux and his mother had come over for dinner the day after Christmas and both Kylo and Hux must have looked upset, missing other people while still trying to absorb the family. It also meant he was home and unwinding after finals. Rey had come to love Christmas and the rush of so much food and presents and family. She had a new outfit for each day and he’d managed to calm himself down enough to sit and hear her describe where each one came from. She wanted to start sewing her own clothes, to do something creative. School was too boring, she said, and she was bored all of the time. He knew that she was missing classes to be by herself and wanted to talk to her about it, but let her have her lies. He told her it was good to have hobbies, even though his spare time was spent at the gym or sleeping.

She showed him her latest drawings. He’d noticed how Snoke had changed in her art over the years. He looked increasingly cartoonish, like something from a kids’ movie. The teeth were longer and sharper. Her memory was changing.

They’d bought her a new sweater and a Polaroid camera, one that wouldn’t just save things digitally. She had emptied the film by the afternoon of Christmas morning.

Being with just him seemed to put her in an even better mood and he never wanted to admit to her that he missed Poe. He had started seeing her eyes grow steady whenever Leia would mention him and ask how he was doing. Kylo knew every moment and at first had showed them all pictures; Christmas was different where it was always sunny. But Rey had only been able to smile at pictures of his brothers, since they were getting bigger. She missed him too and when she mentioned it, and he would say the same. But he saved most of his twitching for when everyone went to bed and he had Hux alone with a bottle.

Rey had frowned at him from the stairs, but he promised he’d be up in a while. The only other time she’d been upset was when she asked when she could visit again. And he had to tell her that they’d be home in January and February for her dance concerts, but mom and dad didn’t want her to. And it was the truth and that they’d catch hell for it when grandma left. She wasn’t doing well and he told Rey not to make mom too upset when she yelled at her about cutting back on the time that they spent together. At least wait until grandma went home.

And then his frustration about everything came to a head when he sat down on the couch and Hux muted SportsCentre on the television.

And now Hux was holding him to his confessions that night.

His cheek twitched at it.

Paige and Poe were holding him back from taking the shot and letting the conversation die.

“No, no, no,” Paige was saying. Did he tell her? The look in her eyes was saying that Hux hadn’t. “What’s in the pocket? That’s my next truth. I’ll take the shot right now to skip to my turn.”

Poe had mostly been trying to block Paige from her goal. He was trying to be on his side when he spoke, but he knew he was curious. He was interested in finding out anything that was remotely about him. Their egos were another problem entirely. “That was totally unfair, Hux. You’re being a dick right now. Ky doesn’t want us to know. It’s probably a dead lizard or something else random that he found. He’s worse than the cat.”

Kylo finally pulled his hands away, standing in frustration. “Can I still take the shot and do the dare?”

Paige blinked. “Yeah, I guess. I mean…yeah.”

He pinned her to the couch with his eyes and nodded. He couldn’t look at Poe in that moment. The tequila burned his throat as he still held her eyes before turning away, with no one following him back to the coatrack. He had come there that night with the same weight in his pocket that he’d carried since the start of the school year. Hux was really being unfair in that moment but he was also closer to graduation than he was. His face finally found a smile as he plucked the familiar box from his pocket, knowing that in the end this would push Hux to doing what he was about to do as well.

Returning to the living room, he had his jacket’s contents in his hand, hidden in his fist as best he could. His hand wasn’t that large. “Poe, truth or dare?”

He squinted at him, weighing his mood. “Um, truth?”

He had a response to either answer, but this one was in his favour. Revealing the small box in his hand, he offered Hux a look stoked with bravado before opening it and turning to Poe.

“Would you ever marry me?”

Paige gasped. Poe just stared at him. It was the same look that asked if he really meant what he was saying and if he was okay all wrapped into an expression that would never be duplicated by another human on Earth. He could only nod in response, making sure that they were both on the same page.

“Fuck you all.” Poe turned away and poured himself a shot with shaking hands. His shoulders were stilled, his back to him from where he stood. When he turned, his heart finally stopped beating. Kylo could see the tears as he tried to wipe them away. “Was this something you two planned? I’m…” Poe didn’t let his mouth run too long for a perfect, hanging moment. “Yes, Ky. Fucking yes. Fucking marry me tomorrow, you fucking asshole, I love you.”

He was met by a hungry mouth and wet eyes, kissing him and dampening his cheeks with happy tears. Poe’s tongue deepened into his and he moaned, despite being in front of their friends. The sound he made caused them both to break the kiss to look down. Paige’s mouth was covered by her hands. And Hux was taking a drink from his beer, looking away.

Poe looked from their friends, back up to him. “Did we just get engaged?”

Kylo, only able to breathe with the other man’s eyes on him, found his voice. “Yeah. I…bought the ring in September.”

Shoving him, Poe stepped away. “So the library fight? You went and got me a ring after a fight over library books and who forgot to return whose? Jesus Christ, I love you, but you have a really twisted way of solving arguments to get out of talking about them.”

He pressed the ring box into Poe’s hands and leaned over towards the coffee table to pour four shots into the messy set of blurring shot glasses. “I wouldn’t be my father’s son if I didn’t pull shit like this.”

He turned to put a glass into Poe’s hand and was met by a shining pair of eyes that he could never betray. This wasn’t a gloss over an argument. It was something he would be held to. And he wanted to follow that path, no matter how it scared him and how uncertain his feet still were.

The four of them clinked their shots together, laughing.

And until he was putting his key into the door of their apartment, he didn’t remember anything between that. Distant memories spun briefly as he studied the doorknob, but he couldn’t pin them down.

“S’okay, I got your phone. And mine,” Poe said, leaning against the wall, scratching at the flaking paint in the hallway. His voice was wobbling in his ears and his hands finally firmed to turn the key. “I got everything.”

He was slurring his words and Kylo narrowed his eyes. He stepped back and looked around the hallway. Nothing seemed out of place; the hallway was empty. No sound from the staircase.

He couldn’t get like this outside of home ever again. “How’d we get home?”

Poe looked around and then finally broke into a laugh, giggles that were only stopped with a hiccup. “I don’t fucking remember. I don’t know! We probably walked. Look, I’m dirty. And hungry. Holy shit.”

The night blinked before his eyes and then faded. Someone stumbled, landing in the mud outside of Paige and Hux’s. Someone else was laughing at the other. Paige was laughing too, outside smoking. Kylo didn’t know how to separate the two.

The door to their apartment finally opened and they were inside. Kylo had enough mind to set both of the locks. He’d found his head again and didn’t want to lose it. He made it to the kitchen after only a few turns and shook his head again. The rooms were spinning too much. He also needed to eat. Dropping to his knees by the freezer, he whined to himself at how empty it was. They hadn’t shopped for Rey’s visit yet. That was on the checklist and he had blown it off.

Poe was beside him, hugging and kissing up his neck, sending him into shivers. “What’s wrong?”

“I’m hungry too.”

“Ky, I just ordered pizza. It’s not even midnight.” Poe smiled into his neck, his warm breath reminding him of the promise that he’d made that night. “I gave them the address across the street. Like you fucking like it with your paranoia thing.”

He managed to smirk at the remark, letting his doubt about what he thought was happening fade away into his drunken state. “It’s not paranoia if they’re really out to get you. How soon?”

He asked the question and got the answer by Poe straddling him on their kitchen floor. He spread out, feeling his weight settle upon him and sighing. The teasing and physical contact had almost been entirely Kylo tonight and he got what he wanted in that time by having his partner on top of him, breathing into his neck as he bit the tender spot behind his ear. “Twenty minutes. Honestly, fuck you for tonight, Kylo. We’re getting pizza and then I’m just going to have to take twenty years to calm down.”

Narrowing his eyes at the ceiling, Kylo frowned, still feeling the other man’s growing erection against him. “But you said yes?”

Bee trotted up, meowing at them at Poe sat up to pet his cat. He glared at Bee as he rubbed against them. Poe, despite how sober he was trying to seem, still reached down to smudge dirt from Kylo’s face with a gentle hand. The gold band on his hand glistened in the dull kitchen light. “Guess I feel dumb that you don’t have a ring.”

Kylo snorted. “Knife drawer. Beside the sharpener. I was…planning”

Poe’s hand instantly reached into proximity of his dick, teasingly brushing the inside of his leg, and he sucked in a hot breath. “How dare you.”

His mouth was back against his, pushing his back against the cool linoleum. In September, when he didn’t storm out of the library, or out of the apartment, he started following the path to allow him to do that. They wouldn’t just be dating; they’d be married. He’d have more space, while also keeping Poe forever. He just wanted there to be someone there on the other side of all of this for him and Rey; he couldn’t do it alone. He leaned into the kiss, he arched up only to be left wanting as Poe stood up to rifle through the cutlery.

Another small box was placed on his chest and Poe giggled, dropping down hard onto him again. He sounded like he was fifteen again, laughing at a game in his room or some idiots in the park. “Fuck, Ky, you really are a romantic. Fuck me.”

Unable to escape an easy opportunity, Kylo leaned up to pull him down into a kiss.

Locking legs and arms, and hands with combined rings, they laid on the kitchen floor and absorbed the energy that they both were radiating. It was what Kylo had wanted for so long; he wanted Poe to feel like he had a place to always call home forever. He had taken Poe away from his father, he’d saved him. In the process, he’d also saved himself. But he’d also taken him away from his mother and the other family. This needed to stick. This home, with a person who loved him, was what Poe deserved. If it had to be him, then it would be.

His phone rang from the coffee table and he groaned. But Poe took care of it, nodding at him as he left the apartment without shoes.

Why did he call from his phone? Why were they both so careless?

Despite how much he wanted to stay prone on the floor, he still pulled himself to his feet to watch the pizza exchange from across the street. Bee brushed against his legs and he pulled a reluctant cat into his arms as he eyed everyone on the street from the balcony. He could jump off the first-floor level and kill anyone who came out from the darkness in an instant. He’d practiced until Poe told him that the neighbours were complaining.

Instead, Poe waved at the deliveryman and then at him, standing too long on the street. It made him itch, but his head started to swim and he needed to force himself to make sure he got inside. When the front door to their building snapped shut, he could breathe again.

He could let the world spin again when he was back inside their walls, locking the door behind him.

“Stop it,” Poe said, sitting down and opening the box. “Let’s just…hey, get that wine I made you buy. I’ve lost my buzz, man. Lost it. It’s gone.”

Kylo eyed him and then shrugged. Maybe he could just black out the entire night and he wouldn’t have pulled them into what he thought he wanted. They didn’t even have wine glasses and just passed the bottle back and forth, spilling red wine all over themselves and the sofa.

When Poe tried to take a piece of his pepperoni from one of his slices, he stopped his hand by placing a kiss on the ring on his finger.

And then the soft memory blinked to him putting the pizza box and empty bottle of wine into the trash. He remembered stopping and staring at the empty bottle, eyeing the fact that there was nothing left. Not good. He had lost time again. He took the time to turn and give the cat food, but the dish was already filled. What had he done in the blackout?

“Ky?” Poe was standing in the living room, only in pyjama pants and swaying. Kylo actually sat up to look at how toned his chest and stomach looked. He was attractive; he never looked at anyone else, but the narrow waist and firm torso was something that made him burn inside because underneath that was someone who chose him without having to. He had to listen to Hux complain about worrying about other guys going after Paige; Poe didn’t need to have that worry. But the person looking unsteady and rubbing his eyes in the apartment at that moment, was someone who turned him on, despite how he was rubbing away vomit from the corner of his mouth. “I got sick.”

“What?” He turned, not understanding and still lost in studying the shapes of his arms. “Why?”

Poe shrugged, rubbing his eyes again. “I’m drunk and it happens. But we’re home? Right? We’re home and you love me? And we’re engaged, right? I don’t remember anymore.”

He shook his head again. He’d lost too much time. He just wanted to sleep. Sleep next to the man who he loved. “Come on. Let’s go to bed.”

Snatching a litre bottle of water from the fridge, he guided Poe to their bedroom. He flushed the toilet and made him brush his teeth. His eyes were losing focus, shoving his own toothbrush into his mouth and seeing reddish-black in the sink. It was the tone of the basement of Snoke’s after another children’s throat had been cut. He couldn’t be drawn into those memories right then; he had to try to keep Poe steady. It was the only thing he could do then as the room started to spin.

Shoving him into the bed with the water bottle in his hands, he pulled off his shirt and jeans. At least he thought he did that. When he flashed into the bed, he met a giggling, but clean mouth. It was a mouth, a person, who said he loved him. And it blurred into a mixture of feelings that would take him weeks to untangle. They drank more water and started laughing about nothing. He still pressed the water bottle into Poe’s hands and let their fingers linger together.

They were both too drunk to have sex, but the kisses still deepened until they slowed and he felt Poe fall asleep on his chest. He wasn’t far behind him.

The next morning was going to be painful.

But the last thing he thought about, as he breathed in the muted sickness in Poe’s hair, was that he’d done a thing that he’d never thought that he’d do. He’d made a promise that mattered to both of them.

And that he’d done on stupid impulse.

 

-=-

 

Rey was too excited to go stay with Kylo and Poe. And it was her birthday. It was spring break and Kylo had promised that there would be no studying this weekend for her. She didn’t mind trying to help him with his homework but his papers weren’t exactly some dumb book about a guy being out in the woods that made so sense. She just copied Rose’s notes until the teacher asked her something that she didn’t know and got in trouble.

Kylo’s thick textbooks and tired eyes made her already know that she didn’t want to go to college. She got tired so easily in class, exchanging glances with Finn and then giggling to herself. He was getting cuter every day.

They were leaving early, but Rey had set the alarm on her phone for four a.m. so she could do her sit-ups and push-ups. She woke up to a picture that Kylo didn’t know that she’d taken; he was sitting on the porch, looking over at Poe and his jaw was just set in such a way that she needed to keep that look forever. She hated the way her stomach and arms had looked in her dance pictures and decided that this was the only way to fix it. Dad had put a dance bar in for her in the basement, where Kylo used to have his weight set. He had packed it into the garage when he left. But when he moved back, they could still share the same space.

She took a shower at 5.30, deciding that it wouldn’t sound weird then. Mom and dad would know how much she wanted to see Kylo and tell him what happened. She washed down her body, glad that her scars were still fading, but hating how her tummy looked. It still stuck out too much. She needed to do more sit-ups and probably not have that much for breakfast.

For once, it felt good to know how to be hungry all of the time.

Picking up mom’s razor, she eyed the hair on her legs. It was still light and blonde, but thick. It matted in patches on her legs like an animal. Rose said that she had started shaving her legs but Rey didn’t believe it. Rose always wore tights in dance or track pants in gym. Finn had touched her leg to get her attention last week and she knew that he’d felt how hairy they were. Still, It wasn’t like Kylo’s facial hair; that was thick and dark. He was always careful when he shaved and she would watch him in the mornings.

It was not that long after they got home and into freedom; he refused to have his parents anywhere near them. Dad had wanted to show him how to shave and Kylo had slammed the door after getting what he wanted, but not what he needed. He had handed Rey his phone and they watched a video together, showing him how to do it. He cut himself and she saw how it hurt. She remembered how she wanted to tell him to get dad, to be nicer to him. But then he rinsed his face and told her that he wanted to tell her a secret; if she kissed his cut, then maybe it would get better. She was so happy to learn that. If she’d known that before, then maybe she could have made so many of his other cuts and wounds feel better.

And then, by the time the boys moved out, they both filled up the sink with thick, dark hair and no apologies for not cleaning it up.

She decided that since she was a woman now, it was time to shave her legs in that moment.

There was no one there to show her a video on her phone, but she could figure it out on her own. Kylo had put this on her by not being there for so much. Blobbing mom’s shaving cream onto her legs, she stuck her leg into the corner of the tub and tried to get her balance. Breathing out, she ran the razor up to her knee and stopped.

Was the hair gone? She reached down and felt the clean patch. It was smooth and she grinned to herself. She had done it all by herself.

The next part of her leg, her hand moved to quickly and she felt the heat of pain scratch against her shin. Hissing, she exhaled as she shook with anger at herself. Taking quick breaths she shook her head. Nothing was perfect the first time. She didn’t have to be perfect the first time.

But that was the only cut. And it only bled a little.

Just to make sure, she ran the razor under her arms. There were only faint hairs there too, but she wanted to make sure.

By the time she was out of the shower, it was six a.m.

Leia came to knock on her door about fifteen minutes later. Rey was still deciding what to wear, wearing the robe that she’d gotten for Christmas from grandma and looking at her closet.

“You were up early,” she said, sitting on her bed and yawning. She looked over and smiled at her. “I was going to make sure that you were packed, but you already are.”

Rey grinned back. “I packed yesterday. It’s the longest I’ve waited to pack.”

“Oh, wear the new dress. The one we got last week. You look so pretty in it.” Leia was leaning back on her neatly made bed. “Rey, you know I don’t mind making your bed for you. Let me do a little more around the house. You’re making me look lazy.”

She could only shrug, taking the dress out of the closet. It was light blue and hid how fat she looked. It would be perfect. “I’m sorry, mom. When Kylo and Poe come for a weekend, they can make messes for you to clean up.”

If only they came home more often, Rey wanted to say but kept the words in her mouth.

 

-=-

 

Instead of meeting at the apartment, they were having lunch at a really nice restaurant. Rey knew that it was nice because the menu was posted outside the door. She was so happy about being eleven. Kylo had booked the table weeks ago; he’d texted her that, sending her the menu even then. She loved being able to text him all the time with the phone that he had bought her. When he was studying, his messaging would get delayed, but when he was watching a movie with Poe and was bored, he would text all of the time. At least that’s what she guessed was happening.

But both Poe and Kylo looked exhausted when they met them outside of the place.

Dad managed to laugh. She wasn’t laughing.

“Didn’t I tell you not to plan this much after your birthday? God, Kylo. Look at you two.” Dad still hugged him and chuckled, one of those deep dad laughs that meant he would be amused about this the rest of the afternoon. He hugged Poe next, looking at him with even more sympathy. He wasn’t even allowed to really drink, Rey wanted to say, but she held her tongue.

“It’s okay, we’re fine.” Kylo said shaking his head. “Really. We were at Hux’s and…we got home in one piece.”

“Many pieces.” Poe winced, looking pale. Kylo held his hand as a waiter walked up and show them to a table. Kylo had hardly looked at her; he’d smiled hello but then dad had started talking. She shifted her weight in her new dress. Didn’t he know what had happened?

The last time they were home she was still ten and they were treating her like a baby. They just slept the entire time. When she was tired of hugging dumb stuffed animals, she finally came downstairs and climbed into Kylo’s arms, ignoring the other hands that were wrapped around his waist.

Kylo was good at college. Why did he just want to sleep all of the time at home? They were supposed to do things together. They did eventually. Kylo would shake his head, bored with doing nothing, and watch her do the latest dance step that she’d perfected.

She was also mad at dad. He had said that _getting settled in_ wouldn’t take so long. Now, it was like Kylo didn’t even want her there. There was always too much homework. And she didn’t want to talk about her schoolwork. It all felt stupid looking at what they had to read.

They were only sitting down for a few seconds when Kylo took Poe’s hand and she felt her frown deepen and the ghost cramps in her stomach returned. “Go tell Leia what happened.”

Poe shook his head and slicked back his hair with a nervous hand. “Come on, Ky, really?”

“Yeah, tell her what happened. About how stupid I was on my birthday. We’ll figure the rest out later. This will be important to mom right now.” Kylo actually smirked at the end and Poe’s eyes lit up. It was something stupid Kylo did when he was drunk. Rey didn’t want to hear about Kylo being drunk and forgave the secret in that moment.

Kylo turned towards her as the other two moved off to the side. He opened his arms and she hugged him tightly. Finally, he was just hers again. It had been too long. He smelt clean and good. He hadn’t just been lying in bed all day. He might have been sick the night before, but she didn’t smell it in his hair.

“Happy birthday,” he said, still holding her. “I love you.”

“I love you too.” She looked up at him, grinning. “You don’t smell that bad.”

He looked at Han and then back at her. “I try, for you. It was okay, last night Rey. We just did college things. I’ll tell you later when mom and dad aren’t here. I promise. Bee misses you. He’s been meowing all week and head butting me.”

Mom and Poe came back to the table and she saw Leia reach for Han’s and squeeze it. Whatever had happened must have been bad. Poe’s hand fell in Kylo’s and they both looked embarrassed.

“Well,” Leia said. “For those that can have it, we’re getting champagne for your birthdays. I’m sorry, Poe and Rey. But you two can pick another nice drink instead.”

She still heard Kylo lean over and whisper to Poe that they could share. When he looked at Rey, she shook her head. No champagne that day for her. At least he asked her.

She just wanted her protector.

And when he turned his attention towards her, they could float up into their bubble again. He was smiling only at her, letting his brown eyes widen at her stories from school.

When the waitress broke their conversation, she started to be annoyed by everyone around them again. It was happening more often. Something would happen and her mood would just twist into anger. She tried to force it down and be calm.

Why did they all have to be there? Mom and dad just complained about everything that she did. How she needed to do more school work; they didn’t know how boring it was. Kylo was good when he texted but when Poe was there, he’d have to talk to him too. Didn’t Poe know how annoying he was sometimes? She sat up straighter, trying to look thinner and studied the menu.

Kylo helped her order, even though his hand was still locked with Poe’s. They both drank a lot of water, sucking it down as quickly as it was poured. But Kylo was trying really hard to be focused on her; he didn’t really need to try, he just had to be him. She wanted a salad without too much dressing and then something with chicken. He pointed out the things that he thought were good, things that she liked. He still knew what he liked. Kylo knew what to eat for fewer calories and more protein. She saw that in his eyes as he pointed out what she would want to try.

“How’s school?” Kylo asked.

She shrugged. School was awful. She was getting in trouble for leaving class and not coming back because she couldn’t focus and the subjects were boring. She didn’t want to try on her tests and even when Han and Leia talked to her about it, she’d lie and say that it wasn’t because she missed Kylo. It was always something else. Kids were picking on her. It wasn’t a full lie. Someone had written that _Rey Solo is a rape baby_ in the girl’s washroom and they had to have a big meeting about it.

“It’s okay,” she said. “But dance is going really good. Did you know that Paige is going to teach us in a couple of weeks? She’s got a practicum for her school. Can you get that?”

Smirking, Kylo shook his head. “But it would be fun if I could. When I have the internship during my last year, I can see if I can work at the station again.”

He was lying to make her happy and she read through it. As if he’d go anywhere than back to Virginia.

But the lunch was nice. Kylo seemed like he just wanted to talk to her, to catch up and not just through texting. Mom and dad were making sure that Poe wasn’t too stressed out over school and let him complain about how his professors didn’t like him. He also apologized for not getting good enough grades for a scholarship again. He felt bad taking their money.

But when he wasn’t talking to them, he’d be sipping champagne from Kylo’s glass or taking bits of vegetables from his plate when Kylo wasn’t looking.

As long as Kylo was looking at her, it was okay.

 

-=-

 

Back in the apartment, leaving mom and dad behind them for the drive home, she hugged Bee and sat with him on the couch. The warm, orange cat brushed against her face, bopping his head against hers. He looked thin and she guessed that they didn’t feed him enough.

Lifting her eyes, she watched the boys look through the fridge. Mom and dad had accepted that they forgot to buy food, and they stopped and bought groceries. Kylo let her pick and plan the meals; there was the fun part. She could cook for them. Kylo or Poe still needed to help her with the hard stuff.

They still moved like one person, Poe always following Kylo, touching his sides and asking him where everything should go so Kylo could roll his eyes and put it away. At least Kylo looked better now, after lunch. He’d eaten without her having to tell him to eat; and Poe only took a few vegetables before he started tearing apart a bread roll and leaving crumbs everywhere. But Kylo’s eyes were brighter now. She felt so proud of him.

Needing to get their attention, she cleared her throat. Bee purred in her lap, making sure she was okay. At least he wasn’t lonely when she was there.

“I kind of want to see a movie tonight,” she said. “We can do that right?”

They turned, like animals, and closed the fridge after getting two more bottles of water. Kylo was the first one to look at her and the first one to sit beside her, but didn’t look like he wanted to talk. He just put his arm around her and drew her closer. Poe was still opening his bottle of water. He drank half of it setting it down on the table

“Sure, sweet pea. Do you want to do it at home or at the theatre? We might need to take a nap before we drive anywhere, but we can totally do it.” He sat next to Kylo and put his hand on his leg. “We don’t do this a lot, you know that. Last night got only a little crazy. You know?”

She didn’t know. She sighed, looking up from his hand back to his face. “Maybe here? Theaters are still kind of weird to me. My friends make me go and I don’t like how big it all is.”

Even as she was talking, she heard Kylo yawn and put his head on Poe’s shoulder.

“Yeah, that’s probably a good idea. He’s really tired. Hey how’s school been?”

Poe was faking being interested. The trigger in her chest snapped again; he didn’t care. Even as she told him how Finn had decided that he had liked her more than Rose, he had lifted Kylo’s hand to kiss it and then nodded, just acting like he hadn’t heard what she’d said. His stupid smug face was enough to make her stop talking.

All she wanted to do was talk to Kylo and he was falling asleep.

“Kylo?” She asked, loudly. “Can you wake up?”

Blinking, he sat up. “I’ve been awake the entire time.”

Huffing, Rey shook her head. “You knew I was coming and you had a party.”

“It was my fault…” Poe started to say and she latched onto it.

“Stop taking the blame for him.” She grit her teeth.

The words seemed to bring life to Kylo’s eyes and he looked at her. “What?”

She didn’t feel like explaining things to him that he should actually know.

Rolling her eyes, she stood up and set her arms hard across her chest. She even wore a bra today. “You always have to stay here and study. You’re always studying. You’re never home and I can’t be here like I used to before. Because Poe sucks at college and shouldn’t have even gone because he’s stupid.”

Now she felt them both sit up and look at her with sharp awareness. Bee buzzed against her leg and she shooed him away. He didn’t need to be there for this. He was too precious. He didn’t deserve to be Poe’s cat.

“You’re being really unfair right now, Rey,” Kylo said, surprising her. “This was what we always talked about. When things get busy here, we won’t have time together but when we’re done it will just be us and…”

“I always have to text _you_ Kylo,” she said with a sneer. “The last few months, I had to be the one to make you talk to me. Did you forget me? You were never supposed to forget me!”

She could almost see how Kylo’s heartbeat increased as he sat up more. Poe’s hand was planted now on his leg. “That’s not how it really is, Rey. You know that.”

“I know what my phone tells me.” She rolled her eyes, lying. Kylo would text her in the morning and the evening. He’d tell her that he loved her. But right now the truth didn’t matter; she was listening to the throbbing anger building in her chest. “Can’t it just be you and me? Like it used to be? Why does he always have to be here?”

Kylo dared to glare at her. “Because he lives here. He’s lived with us for almost five years, Rey. And don’t talk about him like he’s not here.”

Feeling her nostrils flare, she snorted. She knew that it wasn’t cute, but she was too angry to stop it. “You talk about _me_ like I’m not here.”

She had tried for years to understand how Kylo could break phones and promises like they were nothing. When she was little, when she was dumb, it was easier to forgive him. He was damaged and broken; he could melt down at any minute into tears or anger. She had to take care of him. And the lift that she felt when she got help and a new friend, one who smelled good and smiled so much, was a push towards growing up. She loved them both and they loved her. But when they moved away, it was all about ‘settling in’. They’d had almost two years to settle in. Kylo left when he was nineteen and now he was twenty-one.

He’d made promises to her too.

She was eleven now and could make Kylo know how angry she was. How she felt it everyday. It wasn’t just about him leaving, it was about how growing up hurt so much and he hadn’t warned her enough.

He finally stood, looking down at her with slumped shoulders. Why couldn’t he try to look taller for her too? “Hey, what’s going on, angel? Tell us.”

Tell _us_. Not _tell me_.

She bit her lip. _Can he leave so we can talk?_

 _No, because he lives here._ “So stop what you’re doing. Rey, I know that school is rough right now but if you told me, told us, I could help you. We both could help you. He was in the world when he was in your grade. He’s read those books. And he’s not stupid.”

“I remember, Rey. I remember those grades and I can help you find the answers,” Poe said and she didn’t look at him. “Come on, sweet pea, what’s wrong? We’re not mad….”

“Oh, don’t try to sound like mom and dad. And by the way, they’re not your _real_ mom and dad. They’re not mine either.” She turned to glare at him.

“I know.” His eyes were still soft, so him. She didn’t have a real reason to hate him and tried to blink back the hateful emotions that pressed on her eyes. “Hey, Rey, we want to be home every weekend or we want you to be here every weekend. I can’t cook to save my life and we’re starving because Ky has learnt nothing from you. Neither of us did. But if you’re having trouble in school, with anything, don’t just text Ky silly things. Actually talk to him.”

Setting her head down to close her eyes, she shook her head. “They’re not silly things.”

She’d just asked Kylo what boys liked. How she should dress. If she looked fat. How it was like to kiss a boy who she really liked. And of course Poe didn’t understand them.

Kylo was quiet, chewing on his finger until Poe made him stop. She felt her rage rise again at the touch.

“I got my period and you weren’t there!” She screamed, right into Kylo’s face. She was so close that she could still smell alcohol on him. He didn’t smell like himself. “I got it at school and you couldn’t come get me! You were busy being here. I’m supposed to be here too. You _promised_ Kylo!”

She watched Kylo swallow a breath and reach for her, stepping away from Poe. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

As if he knew how embarrassing it was, how much it hurt two weeks ago. As he if knew what it was like to have classmates tease her about her bloodied jeans. How the nurse didn’t understand that he wasn’t her brother. That’s why she didn’t call. Dumb adults were always making things worse and being awful. She just laid in her bed and cried for a week and had mom help her, showing her where the supplies were and how to hold a hot water bottle to her stomach and how no one cared if she made a mess in the bed. They could always get new sheets and she just needed to say when something felt wrong. But to Rey, it was all wrong. She could never sleep in Kylo’s bed again without worrying that she’d make a mess. She couldn’t wear favourite pair of white jeans again because they were ruined. Everyone who was an adult had tried to warn her, but not enough. It was betrayal by default.

And now the two people she’d grown up with were in that same group.

Maybe she couldn’t trust either of them.

“Because you were supposed to be there.” Rey pushed him away and gave him the deepest glare that she could manage. She tried to look like him, act like him. Be filled with hate.

He stepped back, his eyes wide.

But he didn’t say anything.

He just let her move by him and run into her room, the room with the stars, and hold her pillow until she started to sob. The feelings grew heavier, into a wail. It wasn’t enough just to cry.

She hadn’t felt this much pain in almost seven years and she wanted to bring it all down on herself as she wept into her pillow until she almost forgot what she was crying about.

She wanted to forget how she hated Kylo. Poe was just a part of it. She couldn’t hate him, but still wanted to. Kylo had managed to grow up and be normal because of him.

So it really was all Kylo’s fault.

 

-=-

 

A careful knock on the door broke her from staring at her hands. She’d been looking at them when she woke up and hadn’t stopped.

“No, Kylo! Go away!”

“It’s just me. If that’s okay.” Poe opened the door and his eyes held the sadness that broke her. She nodded and put her head back down again. “Hey, sweet pea, what’s going on?”

“I _hate_ him. I wish he never saved me. I wish I was as dead as he is.” She yelled into her pillow, ignoring the hand that was on her shoulder. Kylo was being so unfair right then. He’d been unfair the last two years, when he decided to move away from her and not be there when important things were happening to her.

“Rey, come here.” Poe was asking her, not telling her. His hand didn’t demand that she move either. She bit her cheek hard and turned into his arms. “Hey, it’ll be okay. I promise. Ky’s really hurt right now for you. He doesn’t know what to do and that freaks him out.”

“Why do you get to have him and I can’t?” She sobbed, gripping at his sweater.

She felt him sag and then straighten. “Because life isn’t fair. That’s what I told him and that’s what I’m telling you. Rey, this isn’t forever, the living apart stuff. We really want you to be here but we have to think about your future. We need to figure out why you hate school, if it’s the other kids, if it’s the teachers, if it’s just because you miss him. That’s why you can’t be here; it’s nothing that Ky and me decided. Talk to Ahsoka more. I heard what mom and dad said, that you’re sort of withdrawing from her.”

She nodded. “She started pointing out what’s wrong with me one day. It was like every other conversation. It made sense and then I just got…so mad that I wanted to burst. Like, explode. I never yelled at her before. I liked her. I still like her.”

Poe hugged her again. “Hey, it’s okay. I live with him everyday and he can scream until the neighbours complain. But I calm him down, if I’m not angry too. It gets fucked up sometimes because he knows how to push my buttons and I can’t always keep it in, you know? But we always apologize and talk about it. And the next time isn’t as bad. So maybe just say that you’re sorry and mean it. And tell her how you feel. I know that you already do so…”

The six weeks that they had had alone when Kylo was in Virginia flashed in her mind. She only got mad at him once the entire time. They were sending Kylo a package during the first week he was away, putting things into a shoebox that they’d found under Leia’s bed. And he made a joke about one of her pictures: _is this a chicken or something? What did you draw here? Tell me because I’m dumb_. Kylo always got her pictures and he didn’t understand. She ignored him the rest of the day and wouldn’t talk to him until it was time to talk to Kylo on the computer.

“I’m pretty good at going to therapy,” she mumbled. “I just want to know when I can stop going. No one tells me. But Kylo got better, right?”

Poe bit the inside of his mouth. “He’s still got good and bad days. Things aren’t perfect between us, but we’re working it out. I’m only here because he wants me to be here and needs me here too. We really want you here, believe me. It’s easier when you’re here. But he’s been planning this since he was sixteen and he just puts his head down and gets what he wants and forgets what he needs. Fuck, Rey, I’d go home tomorrow if he didn’t need me and I didn’t need him. But he needs you too; he’s never stopped needing you. We talk about you everyday, how we need a better place, maybe closer to a school for you so you can be here all of the time. Maybe it will be a good school, one that you like, you know? He wants to go to grad school now. That fucking checklist... He’s going to do this whether we like it or not, this school thing. And I’m going to help him make the best choices. Okay?”

Rey took a deep breath, stilling her tears. “You don’t want to be here?”

“Yeah, with him I do. But studying here, being here with everything else? I hate it. He thinks people are following us and gets all weird. He follows my friends sometimes when he’s got nothing better to do and they get creeped out. I’m holding on with both hands to keep him from freaking out and to keep my own head above water. I have to study twice as hard as he does and he sometimes doesn’t get it.” Poe’s words came out as unspoken thoughts, hitting her with every syllable. “But when he does, I’m just like, hey, there’s my guy. There’s the person who I love and it’s okay. It’s not perfect, but when he’s good, it’s as close to perfect as I deserve. He messes up but we need to be there for him and not forget ourselves.”

Exhaling, Rey nodded. It did feel better to know that Poe didn’t like some of the things that Kylo did and was trying to make it better. But there was still a weight on her chest. “What’d you tell mom before? What’s Kylo not telling me now?”

Poe bit his lip, stepping away from her. “You’re still pretty mad right now at him. We’ll save it for another time. When all of us can talk.”

She forced herself to narrow her eyes at him, pushing every bit of darkness into her to her look. Poe ran his hand through his hair and that’s when she saw it, the gold on his finger. She’d seen it before but hadn’t noticed it. Her brain had hid it from her, trying to protect her.

For the first time, in a very long time, Rey felt pure rage erupt in her chest. It wasn’t just the anger from before, but it was even worse. It burnt like a monster, trying to claw its way out of her ribcage. Like Snoke was trying to rip her apart from the inside out. And she let it tear out of her flesh, splitting her open.

“Get _out_. I hate you too! I hate you the most!” She got up from the bed and shoved him. He was a grown man and didn’t stand up for himself as she pushed him again. “All you’ve _ever_ wanted was to fuck him! To have him fuck you! I saw that when you were fifteen and then you were always _there_ around him. You never cared about me and you never wanted to be my friend. All you wanted was him to yourself!”

Poe stopped her hands when she tried to punch him. “Rey, that’s not fair. You know that I love you too and…”

“Don’t touch me! Get out of my room!” Rey screamed and thrust her wrist from his grip. She dove onto the bed and buried her head in the pillows “I fucking hate you and I wish that you were dead like everyone else!”

She cried into her pillow and hoped that she’d fall asleep, letting the words burn onto her heart.

 

-=-

 

There was really nothing that they could talk about. They didn’t want to sleep in their room together. The awful afternoon had stretched into a night without dinner. No one wanted to eat and even asking Rey had resulted in more shouting. Instead, they sat on the couch, watching the news on mute.

Poe hugged him closer, gripping his hand.

Deep down, he knew that this would happen. But he thought that their bond was stronger than his worst fears.

“We can break up, forget all of this for her,” Poe said, his voice barely breaking the silence. “Like I said when we were kids, we can break up and just be…friends again.”

The words hung like smoke around them. It clouded his eyes and he needed to clear it away before his tears returned. Kylo kissed his forehead. “That’s not what you want.”

Poe sat up, forcing him to meet his eyes. “Ky, we fight. About stupid things. Normal people don’t do that.”

He shook his head. “Those are excuses. So, we’re not normal? I always wanted to be like that but I will never be. But you decided that you liked someone who was beyond lost in high school because you thought that he was sad and needed a friend. And that you needed a friend too. And you put up with the nightmares, the post-trauma shit that will never go away. I mean, when we have sex and I freeze up? And you still stay with me? That’s not normal; but that’s just you. Right? You were my friend when I needed it the most. Rey needs someone like that too. But it can’t be me forever, even though I always want it to be me. I’m never going to be out of her life, but I can’t be at the centre of it anymore.”

“Because I’m standing in the way.” Poe’s eyes dropped, still looking at their hands. “I’ve been in the way for five years.”

“You’ve been keeping me steady for five years.” Kylo gripped their hands together, shaking his head. “You became a part of my family. Who cares about the stupid fights? My parents fight about the colour of a rug or who didn’t empty the dishwasher, about how fucked up their son is and how the little girl in their house is crying all of the time. Rey is your family too. And she’s just like me when I was a teenager: filled with anger for anything unfair. But those were just thoughts. And I still think that way now and again and I know that it’s wrong now too, but we can’t stop it. But we can make it make sense. It’s not good for her to miss school and time with her friends to come stay with me.”

Leia had warned him about Rey’s mood swings. Han had told him about how her grades were slipping. Every time she came back from staying with them, she’d act out more. She wouldn’t eat and would leave the house for hours. Both of those facts terrified him. The campus therapist—some loser who didn’t deserve to finish his PhD by how he reasoned, but it was free and someone to unload on—had finally said something that made moderate sense. She wanted him to come home. He wanted her to learn how to live with the distance because he was forcing himself to come to that truth and exist with it everyday. The feelings wouldn’t get easier if she kept seeing him so often, the moron had said. It was the cause of some of the fights with Poe; Poe wanted them to go home more. Being constantly pulled back to that house was a perennial hurt; it was the past but it was always haunting him.

Poe’s eyes were still down, but then they lifted. “You really want to be with me? You make me doubt it when you do things to push me away and then try to get me back. You start fights just to let me win.”

It was true. Kylo would start an easy argument, just to hear how Poe would react. He’d hold back from snapping, from letting his real anger show. He’d let Poe have the small victories. His war was his own.

“When we’re done with school, I’ll take a break. No grad school, fuck that. We’ll get married. And I’ll stop being such a dick and let you do what you want for a bit. There’s still so much money in the fund that we can buy a house wherever. Back home if you want.” Kylo wanted to get the words right, to make sure that he meant it. “Put my stupid dreams on hold for a bit.”

His eyes drifted to the FBI application form that was always stuck to their fridge door. It had been the first thing that he’d put there when they moved in, before any of the boxes and suitcases. Poe would doodle on it, or write grocery lists on it. Or write that he loved him on it. And Kylo would always replace it with a new form, putting the other ones in an organized box in the top of the closet.

“Yeah, your dreams hit me in the face every time I make dinner.” Poe smirked, following his eyes. “Ky, it’s okay. I think I’ll be perfectly happy being your trophy husband as the FBI kicks your ass, doing nothing but playing video games and swimming in the pool that _we will_ have. And Rey will still hate me but will at least laugh at my jokes again by then.”

Kylo leaned down to kiss him. “Whose fantasy are we in now?”

“Maybe both of ours?” Poe grinned at him, then laid down on his chest. “Ky, I’ve been hungover as fuck all day. Arguing with you two has really fucked with my perspective.”

They kept watching the news in silence until Kylo felt him fall asleep. He kissed his forehead and then shifted away, laying him down on the cushions and pulling the blanket over him. He grumbled lightly, rolling over to face away from him.

Kylo sighed as he turned off the television and the lights. He still left the hall light on for Rey.

He stopped at her door, knocking lightly.

“Come in, Kylo.”

He stepped inside, seeing her sitting under the covers with the cat in her lap. “How are you doing?”

 _I hate everything. And I hate hating everything._ She blinked in response. _I hate him. And you for doing what you did._

He took two careful steps forward. _You shouldn’t. You don’t need to._

Rey looked away for several painful heartbeats before she tapped the bed, her face still furious. _You can come here._

 _Thank you_.

He sat down on the edge of the bed and reached for her hand. She shook her head, still petting the cat.

“You should have told me first. You should have talked to me if you want to get married.” Her voice remained sour. “Do you even really want this, Kylo?”

He reached out and Bee came to him, purring and snuggling against his hand. The stupid cat was the only one in the apartment who didn’t want to start a fight with him at that moment. “I want you there too, Rey. You and me, we’re forever. You saved me and I saved you. Doing other things doesn’t take that away. And he means a lot to me.”

“You didn’t answer my question.” Rey folded her arms. “I love you. I’ll always love you. But I can’t be happy about this right now.”

He met her amber eyes, drawn into them and how they sat perfectly in her face. She’d always been perfect and she was just growing more beautiful with every year. He hated himself for not being there for her when she needed him. And it would keep happening. The only way he could deal with those feelings was by having someone to talk to. They weren’t meant to grow apart, but they were supposed to grow up. He was through with the harder parts, but there were still so many years left for Rey.

“I knew you wouldn’t be,” he said. He’d thought about that the entire morning, how he’d acted on impulse and didn’t have Rey in his mind when he’d asked last night. But the morning, he’d showered and still having alcohol lingering in his system, quietly wept to himself about what he’d done to her. He was going to have to avoid the news on her birthday, but he couldn’t keep it from his mother. Everyone always wanted something from him and he was never good enough. “Tomorrow, it will just be us, okay? Your day. We can talk about this, or we can talk about you. All of this will still be there, but I want tomorrow to be about you.”

Rey’s arms slowly loosened. “I’d like that.”

He smirked, picking up the cat to pass it to her. “Can you apologize to him? Maybe?”

“I always made you apologize.” Hugging Bee, Rey exhaled. He could see the thought turning in her head and heart. “I’ll feel better in the morning.”

He took that as a promise. He leaned over and kissed the corner of her eye, pulling back to grin at her. She looked at him with bright eyes rather than the anger that he had felt before.

“I love you.”

He kissed her forehead. “I love you too.”

He backed out of the room, holding her happy eyes close to his heart.

“Want the door open or closed?” He asked, shrugging.

“Open a little, so Bee can get out. Kylo, I can think for myself. He doesn’t have to sleep on the couch. I know where _he_ sleeps.” Rey was getting comfortable in the bed, but her words were still her own.

He nodded, leaving the door open enough for the stupid cat to paw it open if he needed to.

He closed his eyes in frustration and then shook it off. He made his way to the couch and woke his idiot fiancé who probably hadn’t emptied the litter box.

“Come on,” he said. “Come sleep in the bed.”

“Hmm?” Poe’s eyes dully focused on him “Why?”

He rolled his eyes. “I can carry you.”

He’d said the wrong thing and Poe’s sleepy grin widened. “Can you really?”

He didn’t like being exhausted and dared at the same time. He gripped him by the arms, still gentle enough so Poe could break it, pulling him up from the couch. He kissed him in his arms, letting the emotions of the evening take over fully as he tried to lift him fully.

“No, put me down, this is too fucked up,” Poe swatted him away, awkwardly finding his feet. “Maybe carry me another time? Let’s just go to bed. This is the worst couch ever. Why did I let you buy it?”

“I liked the colour. You liked that I actually liked anything.”

Kylo followed him down the hall to their room. Brushing their teeth in the half-bath off of their bedroom, Poe leaned against him again. He was still doubting how he felt, but Kylo felt the same. Still, he couldn’t know that.

Holding the toothbrush between his teeth, he reached for Poe’s hand. He lifted it, so that they could both see the ring in the mirror.

“No breaking up,” he slurred, foam spilling from the side of his mouth. “You’re home. It’s okay.”

Part of him lingered in the idea of splitting up for Rey. It was a tiny part of his thoughts. But it still surfaced. Again, how all of the expectations he had to meet with people were so hard to overcome made him just want to go quiet and be inside his own head. At least with school, he could figure it out. It wasn’t really a lie, because it made Poe feel better. And it still got him a fresh mouth to kiss when he was done rinsing his.

The rule about no sex when Rey was there was pushed to the limit. She’d screamed at both of them from an angry place that they well understood. Kylo still couldn’t slow his hands when they turned off the lights and fell onto the bed.

“She won’t hate me tomorrow?” Poe asked as Kylo kissed up his neck, sucking lightly behind his ear. They were both the most sensitive at the same spot; they were matched. “God, I don’t want her to hate me tomorrow.”

Kylo kept going, nipping at his ear. He was outside of himself, caught in the in between. “She’ll be okay. I want her to be okay. Tomorrow it will just be me and her. Can tonight be you and me? So you’re not sad?”

Poe pulled away, making Kylo squint in the darkness. “Why’d you say that?”

He shrugged and then sat up to pull off his shirt. At least in the darkness, no one could see his scars. Even though Poe knew each one of them, he hated how he needed to see them all of the time. “You get sad. You think you’re in the way. But you’re not. That’s why I said that.”

Poe’s hands crept up his chest, testing him. “Just needed to hear you say that again.”

He leaned down, partly angry but mostly searching for comfort. He kissed Poe and covered his body with his, making him feel his full weight. He felt how he shifted beneath him, taking him in but at the same time still overwhelmed. But he liked that. He liked feeling too much. He wasn’t in pain yet.

“Fuck, Ky, I’m not ready, but fuck.” Poe groaned into his neck as he ground their hips together. “You always call me on my bullshit.”

“And you call me on mine.” He kissed him again. “That’s why we fight.”

They held eyes in the darkness. It was the only place that Kylo knew inside and out, but to Poe it meant something else. It meant being together. Kylo longed to latch onto that side of being in the dark, of feeling safe in it. Poe knew this side of him too, but not like Rey. Maybe that’s why he was still trying to change it for Kylo.

Quick hands removed the last of their clothes, awkwardly shifting against one another and chuckling when elbows got in the way. It was like being drunk again, fucking on the couch the other night when they were too tired to argue anymore about who didn’t sort the fucking recycling. Fuck the recycling. Fuck it.

“God, Ky, we can’t…she’s next door.” He was kissing him again, pressed against his body, feeling the heat between them.

“I can…” he started and then started shifting down Poe’s body to complete the thought. He had his dick in his mouth before Poe had the chance to respond. Kylo had planned it perfectly. He couldn’t reply when he was getting sucked off. He would stop thinking about Rey. She was okay. She didn’t hate them, really. They’d have tomorrow together. If that lie got him through the next few minutes, it was the best one that he’d ever told himself.

Tonight, he needed to do this. In the five years that they’d been together, he’d rarely gone down on him. He’d rather take Poe and fuck him until they both couldn’t breathe, unless he caught the tail end of a ghost memory. But this part always was hard for him. It meant knowing how he tasted. He didn’t hate it because it was Poe; it was part of him. But it meant something bigger. He was nudging onto the other side of his sexuality with this and he only went there because of how he felt for the man beneath him.

Poe squirmed and gripped at his hair as he brought his hand up to stroke in time with his mouth. “Fuck, Ky. Fuck I love you. I love you so fucking much.”

If Kylo didn’t have a dick in his mouth, he would have told him to shut up. Instead he smirked and swirled his tongue in the other direction, moving his hand faster. He knew how this felt and thought he knew how to do it, or at least he had to learn how to do it. This was who he was now. This was what he wanted, what they both wanted. Poe always got him off quick. He could do it faster.

He had to stop to take a breath, to look up, meeting the wanton eyes against the pillows.

“Come here. I can’t come and leave you hanging.”

He shook his head and took him into his hand again, returning his jaw to the work that it had to do.

He wanted to learn how to be good at his. This was the rest of his life. He had to be good at it. He matched his mouth with his hand when he heard Poe moan more, when he set his head back. That meant the touching was good. That meant that he was…

“Ky, I’m going to come. You can stop. Don’t do it if you’re...”

He shook his head and kept going, taking him in until he felt like he would gag. But he didn’t. So he quickened the pace. He had to be good at this, just like with school. _This was the future_. _Their future_.

He didn’t hear the restrained moans beneath him. But he felt the change in his mouth, how the vein straightened beneath him. It was like it had been before, the last time when it was two years ago and they’d fought about where to put the junk drawer. Normal people had a junk drawer, Poe had said. Kylo had argued that normal people didn’t have junk because they threw it out. And he’d let Poe fuck his mouth in the kitchen so he could win the argument and not have too much stuff in their house.

His cock seized and Poe covered his mouth as he moaned. It was a strange sensation. It was something so intimate that Poe was always so willing to do to him, but his own problems constantly kept him from doing it in return. Sex wasn’t about dominance; it couldn’t be. Sex was about being even, about talking. Kylo drank down his come as it spilled into his mouth in lazy spurts. It tasted the same. It was still sweet and salty, but still him. He could do this.

He kept sucking a few moments too long, feeling Poe soften in his mouth before he looked up.

“If you can promise me blowjobs like that the entire time that we’re married and fight about anything, I swear to God that I will argue with you about everything.” Poe’s face was flushed, even in the dull lighting from only the street lamps outside their room. “Come here. Ky, stop being a martyr. Get off too. Don’t be weird with how we’re both feeling right now.”

He snorted and shifted to kiss the man beneath him. Poe never wanted them to kiss after he’d done the same. Kylo didn’t care how either of them tasted. He didn’t need to be afraid of that and Poe should stop feeling that way too.

“I’m going to touch you now, is that okay?” Poe whispered in his ear, even as his hand wrapped around his erection.

“I love you,” Kylo said, knowing how quickly he was going to come. “Don’t leave me.”

“Wouldn’t think about it.” Poe’s voice as pressed huskily against his neck. “Just come for me, Ky.”

He only needed those words to let go.

 

-=-

 

“This is a nice place,” Kylo said, looking around. “I come here to write sometimes. What would you want to do here?”

Rey really liked the café and fixed her sweater. It was too small still, too tight in the arms. She should have probably not have ordered anything with sugar and would have to do more push-ups tomorrow. “I’d like it more if people were smiling. Is everyone always so serious at college?”

He grinned, a rare happy look that showed off his teeth. “Yeah, pretty much. You’re tired all of the time and still agree to do things that make you more tired because people tell you that they’re fun.”

“Guess that’s why I can’t live here all the time.” She forced her voice to sound icier than she meant.

“Rey,” Kylo’s voice started firm and then faltered. “It’s okay for you to feel that way.”

Exhaling, she rolled her eyes. “Don’t just repeat what we hear in therapy. I’m there too, Kylo.”

He looked down at his drink. It was just a latté. He didn’t have any indecision when he’d ordered it. He would normally ask her to order something for him, but now he had a standard drink. He was getting away from her and she needed to stop it.

“I’m always there.” Kylo sounded distant when he spoke again. The rest of the coffee shop grew faint at that point and Rey gripped her drink, trying to keep onto what was real. “We’re always there.”

From the look in Kylo’s eyes, she knew that she shouldn’t bring up how she’d heard them last night.

“I’m tired of being there,” she said instead. “When is it going to stop?”

His large fingers traced the lip of his coffee. “In the quiet moments, it stops.”

Sighing, she picking up a napkin, starting to twist it in her hands. “I’m sorry for being so angry yesterday.”

“Really, it’s okay,” he said, setting his elbows on the table to lean towards her. “Rey, we know each other better than anyone else on this planet. I’ve been there; I’m still there. We’re not getting our damage deposit back because I’ve put so many holes in the pantry wall. But I keep trying.”

“Because of your dream?”

He nodded. “Yes. Having a goal, having that piece of paper on the fridge, I feel better with it. I thought we talked about this for you, over Christmas. That it would be good to have it too.”

Putting her head down, Rey looked at her coffee. She had the old, childish list, with where she wanted to go and what she wanted to do. It all felt so stupid now. There were things she felt like she was good at, but she wasn’t the best. She probably wouldn’t be tall enough to be a dancer. She probably wouldn’t be able to do anything with cooking; all of the television shows were about how hard it was. She hated doing these exercises at school: she just wanted to grow up, she didn’t want to decide what she wanted to be when she was an adult.

“Maybe for me, it’s different,” she shrugged. “Maybe I don’t want to have goals for a while. Maybe I just want to live and be…me for a while.”

Kylo licked his lips, sitting back and folding his arms. He was so much bigger now. She had a hard time remembering how different he looked when he was fourteen, or when her first memories of him stuck in her mind when he was eleven or twelve. His was so thin, but his eyes still burnt the same even now. Having him was her lifeline.

Now, almost seven years later, that life was so far away.

She wanted to be as nice as she used to be, but it was hard not to snap and be fierce and hateful in a second. It happened so often with her friends; Rose didn’t talk to her for a month because Rey had yelled at her when she spilled juice on her favourite shirt. It had been one from Kylo and it was destroyed by cranberry juice.

“I don’t like being angry,” Rey said, finally looking up at Kylo. “Can’t you make it stop for me?”

He reached for her hand. He looked so pained and tired then. “Haven’t I been asking that my entire life?” His lip started to tremble and he pressed his fingers into his eyes. She watched his shoulders shiver before he looked at her again. “Rey, I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I still think that you’re perfect. You don’t have to feel bad about anything that you’re feeling and I’m not just _saying_ that because of therapy. We both keep things from one another and it’s fucking awful but we need to be our own people. I never wanted this to happen to you and I couldn’t stop it because I…”

He paused and then took a long drink from his cup. Rey was frozen, watching how he moved and how he flexed his hands. She was tearing into him now, cutting him down to how they were when they were kids. When it was just them. When it was just them in their bubble, in the safety zone of care.

“I fucked up,” Kylo finally said. “I messed you up. I thought I was making you better by pulling away…”

She never wanted Kylo to feel bad and shook her head. “No, it was fine at the start. I could do it then. But then I started feeling awful about different things. When you’re not home, I can be okay and then someone will say something and I don’t understand anymore. I want to be happy and I want you to be that way too. And I feel worse knowing that I feel sad every time I come home from being here.”

Kylo’s face softened and he sat back again. “This hurts so much, Rey, but please trust me right now. For every reason that you love me, just trust me. It’s important for you to be okay. There are only so many things I can focus on because my head just screams at me all of the time. But you being okay, you being normal, that keeps me focused on any day. On the bad days, it’s working with George, but still you. I don’t stop thinking about you when I don’t talk to you. I wish that we could share thoughts in our mind and not just on the phone. But we need to…you need to start feeling better again. And if not coming here will help that, and we know it will, then maybe that’s what we need to do.”

It wasn’t red rage that filled her eyes, instead it was blue. “What about on the good days?”

He swallowed and shook his head. “You’re doing what I do and avoiding what I said.”

“I heard what you said and I don’t want that. Don’t you always get what you want?”

He shook his head. “Not always. You know that.”

But all she saw in her eyes was how Kylo got his license, got his car, got out of going to jail, got a boyfriend, got to go to an internship at the FBI, and then get into college. He worked hard for all of those things, well some of them happened because he was magically lucky at the same time, and it made her dig down into her early memories. Kylo was able to survive for so long by playing along, by playing others. The only one that had survived was her. Why did he pick her? Why was she worth saving when she felt like this all of the time now?

Kylo exhaled and reached for her hand and she took it. “I’ve had to work hard for everything, Rey. I hate therapy, but I still go. I take the medication. I’m trying to be better. And I have him. He pulls me back, just like you, when I’ve gone out too far. When I’m about to lose myself, he brings me back to you.”

He swallowed at her silence, because she sat back to look at him again. He hadn’t shaved that morning. There was a hint of a moustache there. They’d been too hurried about being late. She hadn’t seen Poe that morning. He was hiding in the bedroom with Bee, probably even hairier.

“So I can’t spend so much time here?” She asked, swallowing her sadness in a heavy gulp.

“You can’t be so split up, Rey. You need to be more grounded. I feel like an asshole for saying that, because I hated whenever anyone said that to me, but I found that. I’m still me and fight against it the entire time, but I have it. And you…you’ll find it too.” He tried to look as serious as could and she finally relented and nodded.

“But that’s so far away.”

He frowned. “I know. It’s always so far away.”

“But…you’re almost there.”

He shrugged. “Not yet.”

“What will I do if I’m not here?” She asked, putting out the question she was afraid to ask. “Should I really…just work harder at school? Be better to my friends.”

Kylo’s eyes lit up. “That’s what I did. And I made it out of there.”

Sitting back, she swallowed. “Maybe I can try.”

His eyes kept the same shine. “That’s what I used to say. And it felt good when I started to mean it.”

She didn’t believe him. Sitting there, in the stupid college café she noticed the ring on his hand too and let her anger blossom again. “Why do you want to marry him?”

He looked up, meeting her eyes and then sat back, sipping his coffee. “I thought that we weren’t talking about that.”

That wasn’t at all what she had said when they got there. The feeling twisted again in her chest, slipping so easily into anger. She had never said that what had made her so angry yesterday wasn’t going to be a part of what they’d talk about that day. Kylo had just taken her words and twisted them. He was being so stupid right now and she needed to make him think clearer.

“You don’t even love him.” The words left her mouth before she could even think about taking them back.

Kylo finished his coffee. He took off the lid and set it aside. He was stilling gradually, his hands moving without him talking.

“How could you say that to me? After what I just told you? Look, Rey, I wouldn’t have been able to get through these years without you or him. I’ve told you about how I feel about him before, but he’s so…I don’t know. He can make me angry for real reasons. Not just someone saying something and it pissing me off, but someone telling me to my face that I’ve done something wrong or messed up. Mom and dad avoided that so much and now I have someone who can say that to my face and mean it and I’ll still love him in the morning. Just like I’m doing to you right now. Say these things to Han and Leia. Say these things to Ahsoka. Poe and I talked about this before you got up and we’re sad that we have to be here, but it will get easier if you…spread it around. The hurt. Like we used to do.”

“But he doesn’t want to be here,” she said quickly. “He’s only here because of you.”

She had been so focused on his hands that she forgot to look at his face as he spoke. When she finally met his eyes, she saw a hurt that she didn’t know she could cause. Even yesterday, she didn’t see the same focus and hooded eyes from him. Now, after she’d given her bitter and hurtful remark, she was meeting another side of his fury.

It had been so long since he’d been angry at her. Had he ever been mad at her before? He needed to be mad at her. He should be mad at her. He should be feeling anything right then.

“Rey,” he repeated, his eyes drilling into her further. “How could you say that to me.”

Sucking in a long breath, she crossed her arms. “Because it’s true. He told me.” He’d left her alone for so long; he had said that he would never do that. And now, she just wanted to hurt him. She had the power to do that. “Kylo, he’s miserable. He doesn’t want to be here. If you really loved him, you wouldn’t just be buying him things and making promises that you won’t keep. So, really, you don’t love him.”

The silent hate in his eyes made her cringe for a moment, but she refocused her eyes; she couldn’t back down. She wanted him to smash the table. She wanted him to break the stillness by knocking their cups aside with an angry swipe of his arms.

Instead, he just sat up straighter. And she tightened her arms across her chest.

“Rey.” His voice was deep and normally the tones of her name would have been soothing, but now, the edges of anger made her shake inside. “You know that I don’t talk this much with anyone else, even him. He takes me into it kicking and screaming. I know why you’re angry. I missed something important to you. And I keep missing other things that are important to you, to us, but our world isn’t the…” he paused, swallowing the crack in his voice. He wiped at his eyes and frowned. “I’m still there, everyday, with you Rey. But I want…at least I think I want it, I want a future for tomorrow. And I don’t have many options right now. And that was because I’m trying to give us the future that you wanted when we were kids. The one that we all wanted. And that will include him.”

Despite the quivering in her stomach, she narrowed her eyes. “ _Why_.”

She had pressed on the right nerve and got the right response. He slammed on the table and stood, but didn’t yell. Only a few heads turned in their direction. This really wasn’t their neighbourhood at home. No one knew them there.

He took a step back and breathed in deeply. His hands were shaking and she could see that he was counting back in his mind, to avoid screaming at her. She longed for him to tell her something with his eyes but instead he just narrowed them.

“That man is fiancé, Rey. I’ve been with him for five years. I love him. Why are you being like this?” His hands rested on the table and she looked from his blunt fingers to the features of his angular face. She saw them growing even sharper and more vicious in her mind. He was asking a stupid question. He knew why she was angry. He knew that anger. He was trying to be dense on purpose.

“Because I don’t think you love him.” She couldn’t stop. She wanted to watch him collapse. “This whole time, you’ve been just pretending so he doesn’t leave you.”

Hissing, he sat down. And, offensively, she heard him counting backwards in Spanish before he responded. “What are you trying to do here?”

She tossed her hands up in the air and groaned. “You’re not happy! How are you in love?”

Kylo fixed his sweater and didn’t react. He looked at his empty coffee cup to distract himself. He was only trying to frustrate her. Finally, he met her eyes.

“I love him. We’re in college and everyone is miserable. We only have one another here.” He clenched his jaw and glared at her harder. “I’m happy when you’re here, but right now you’re being really difficult.”

“I’m allowed to be difficult. Remember, Kylo, I can do whatever I want.” She wanted to flaunt that she could live without him. She wanted to press on the wound that she had created.

Kylo couldn’t leave her. He had to take her home. Instead, he just glared at her. “He loves you. Don’t ever forget that.”

She couldn’t. She never could. Poe nuzzling against her, Poe pulling her onto his lap. She locked onto that, wanting to burn it all down.

“I never asked him to touch me.”

Kylo finally flinched, running his hands through his thick hair. “Don’t you ever accuse him of that. He’d never do that to you. Rey, for fuck’s sake, you grew up with him. He doesn’t even like girls. I’ve tried…and I’m not going to stop trying, I love you too much but this. I caused this. This is all my fault…” He trailed off and his eyes fell away, torn between screaming at her and leaving. “What do you want from me? What do you want, Rey? We love you. That should be enough. That used to be enough.”

“You can’t marry a person I hate!” she shouted. “He didn’t rape me but he took you from me!”

Kylo’s eyes darted wildly. He should have blinked to her in response but he didn’t. “What are you even saying? Rey, I…”

She just started screaming and the moment ended in long and hateful shouts.

 

-=-

 

Dad came to get her. She spent the rest of the day curled up on her bed. Someone would knock on her door and there would be pizza there; they never could cook without her. She never wanted to come there again. Looking at Poe again made her only think of anger and hate. Looking at Kylo just made her feel nothing.

She was cuddling with Bee when she heard Poe and Kylo answer the front door.

“…it’s been awful…we told her and…” Kylo’s voice sounded slow and stupid. “I don’t know what to do, dad.”

She looked at the cat and bit her lip. She was making people hurt; but they deserved it. They were the ones being selfish.

Gliding off the bed and onto the floor, she crept towards the door. She liked how her legs looked as she moved across the floor. They were getting longer and were skinnier than Rose’s, but weren’t the thinnest in her class. Focusing, she nudged open the door with her finger. Bee was nuzzling her, bopping her with his head. It would just look like he opened it.

Peaking out the door, she saw them standing down the hall. Dad had his arms crossed, looking at Poe and Kylo.

“She’s been really sensitive lately. It’s been rough at home, to put it lightly. We’re really frustrated right now. She’s not eating and we hear her exercising in her room all of the time. But hey, you did the same and got better? That’s about all of the hope that we have right now. To keep talking to her, keep sending her to therapy. Keep finding one that she likes.” Dad wiped his eyes and shook his head. “But I’m happy for you two. We’ll figure it out in the five years it will take you to actually get it over with.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Poe said and she could hear the annoying laugh in his voice. She used to like how he sounded and now it was just like a knife in her chest. She was never stabbed at Snoke’s, just cut, but she’d seen the jagged lines on Kylo’s thighs and how they arced deeper and harsher towards his groin. But the last time she’d seen them was two years ago, at the beach. Now the only person who got to see him was her worst enemy.

She’d heard them having sex last night. She was supposed to stay a day longer and had called dad in tears that she never wanted to come back there again. Poe had let that happen; he didn’t respect her. She’d heard his gasps and moans and the only thing that she saw was hurtful shades of red.

Swallowing, she pushed away from the door to finish packing. Whatever she would leave there, she’d make Kylo bring back. She only had to pack the most important things.

She changed and left he pyjamas on the bed. They had been and old gift from Poe.

She wanted to erase him from her mind. All of the times that he’d cared for her were stupid and just pretend. He only wanted Kylo and sex. He was like Snoke, wanting to bite and hurt her.

She burst out of her room, her backpack over her shoulder.

“Can we go home now?”

Poe tried to smile at her and she just glared.

“Rey.” Kylo’s voice was level and in warning. “You can say goodbye to all of us.”

“No, I don’t want to.” She frowned at him and left their stupid apartment and the stupid glowing stars on the ceiling.

Now Rey understood why Kylo hated Hux when they were younger. The moment a friendship ruptured because of the choices of one person, because he chose someone else, sent ripples forwards and backwards. He’d betrayed him, just like Poe was doing right now to her. She had never hated anyone other than Snoke before, but as she slammed the door of Han’s car, she decided that she hated Poe and meant it.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: References to past rape, abuse, suicidal thoughts, manipulative behaviour, stalking. Plus descriptions of m/m sex. 
> 
> I apologise in advance for how long this is but I couldn't stop. It kept coming and coming and I just sort of went 'fuck it'. And if you have the energy to read it, I'm sorry for making everyone feel shitty, readers and characters. This hurt so much to write. Every line was pain. And the next chapter is up in the air still. I've put many hints here and it's come down to about five different options. 
> 
> Thanks so much for reading. And I'm sorry again. The next chapter will be a world of pain, no matter which direction I take.


	27. Chapter 27

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey's plans for escape are interrupted. 
> 
> The final appearance of Poe Dameron in this fic (even though he will haunt it, just not as a ghost even though I want to make him one).
> 
> Read the chapter notes for warnings and pay attention to the tags.

 

Kylo came by every day for a week after she got home. He was missing his break and Rey just slammed the door in his face every time. The front door, the backdoor, her bedroom door. The smack of the wood hitting the frame reverberated in the house and into her confused heart.

Their eyes would lock for only a second and his apologies would cloud his face.

And she didn’t want to hear them or see him.

Every time she looked at him, a piece of her trust broke further. If he had wanted her to be around so much, to be home so much, he should have tried harder before he ruined everything. He was stubborn, selfish, and determined to drive them apart. He was coming there to punish her for not following everything that he said.

She used to listen to him to survive. She kept listening to him because her heart was tied to him: he protected her, saved her, and filled her head with reasons to love him. He was only soft with her, kind to her. He would have to be hard to the other kids to protect her. She was too small, too weak, to protect anyone. He went downstairs, thinking that he was going to die for her. And back then, he acted more to save her than save himself. She’d heard it in his stories, how worried he was about being outside again. But her memories were tainted now not by that boy, but by this man.

She didn’t understand him anymore and that was terrifying. She had only herself to trust.

She could only count on herself to get away from him, to go somewhere that he’d never find her and continue to torment her.

He stopped coming by. Instead, she had to ignore his texts and calls; when he called the house and she’d answer, thinking it was grandma, she’d hang up on him. Poe would text her too, but she blocked that number. She was using her old phone, the one from a while ago, rather than the one that they got her. But she still stared long and hard at her pictures. They were still perfect, by Kylo had ruined them now. They both had. It was hard to look at happiness when it wasn’t real anymore.

Mom and dad told him to give her space. And she had to see a new therapist. And Paige wanted her to talk to her more about not eating. It was just like the last time Kylo had a secret. Everything was always her fault because he lied and she just couldn’t be left alone.

Mom and dad were trying to be nice. They would sit with her and not talk about Kylo, but try to ask what was wrong. It was hard to tell them that her brain was making her think that everything was wrong. The biggest problem made the smaller ones stand out. The words at school hardened in her mind. She was so small and didn’t matter; that thought always pressed on her the hardest.

She was alone. That’s all she could think about when she tried to sleep.

The thought pounded on her everyday when she had to walk by Kylo’s room to go down to the living room. She had to look at Poe’s room every time she tried to practice dancing in the basement. There were pictures of them everywhere and it made her want to scream.

She hated them. She hated her house.

She just didn’t want to be anywhere anymore.

And Kylo was the one to hurt her.

No matter what he said or did, he couldn’t do anything to make this better.

 

-=-

 

Exhausted from driving and talking with his parents, Kylo let his head slump against his steering wheel. He hadn’t slept well the last week; the ache behind his eyes was familiar by now, but he still wasn’t used to it. He’d still try to finish his readings and course work that he’d planned to do over the break, and then spent the rest of the time driving back and forth to his hometown to see Rey.

And she wouldn’t even talk to him. It was a silent wall, her brown eyes locking on to him as she shut him out. Han and Leia said that it was enough now. What he was doing wasn’t working and she was just hurting more. Terrified, he told them how to watch for cutting, how he used to do it. They looked genuinely horrified that he had kept that a secret for so many years. Well, that’s why they had to work harder for Rey. If he couldn’t be there, then they had to help her. Then they had to ask the question why he wanted to be there so often now when he’d been avoiding coming home before.

And he didn’t have an answer, or at least not one that anyone would accept. He didn’t have an answer for Poe or his parents. In his heart he knew that it was because he wanted Rey to learn how to be stronger without him, because he wouldn’t always be there. He was solid in his promise that she would come and live with them. But her whole world couldn’t be him. It would hurt too much if he had to work too often; Agent Jinn’s wife couldn’t deal with him being gone all of the time. He’d pressed Poe hard and he hadn’t broken; instead, Rey had.

He wanted her to be independent and now that she was, he just wanted her back.

“What the fuck am I doing?” he snarled to himself, slamming his car door shut. He shook with anger at himself as he turned on the alarm. With heavy feet, he stomped up to their apartment.

At least there, he had someone to talk to.

“No luck?” Poe looked up from his phone. He had his feet up on the coffee table, his cat curled up at his side.

It was pretty much where he’d left him that afternoon.

He didn’t answer, just hanging up his coat. Kylo shooed Bee away and slumped against him.

“Ky, I’m so sorry.”

“Han and Leia said that I need to stop coming. She’s been miserable all week and panics because she knows that I’ll just show up.” Shutting his eyes, he shook his head. “She won’t even let me talk to her and try to explain.”

“Yeah, because your explanation isn’t what she wants. She just wants you to stop being so stubborn and let her have what you guys used to have.” He kissed his forehead, pulling him closer. “I was there all the time, I saw it. I felt it. She liked me in the beginning because you liked me, or at least liked having someone around who made you feel less worse. But you were always the one to come to her rescue. I just stupidly let you keep telling me that it was okay.”

He sat up. “But it was okay. She said it was okay.”

“Yeah, but getting your period out of the blue? Feeling like no one could come and get you? All of the girls I’ve been friends with have unloaded all of that stuff on me without me even asking. It’s scary and stupid and they feel gross all of the time. She wasn’t going to be a little girl her entire life.” Poe didn’t sound mad. He wasn’t trying to draw him into an argument. Kylo had to keep telling himself that. “Sometimes, the way you talk, it’s like we would grow up and she’d still be a serious little six year old, asking us to show her videos about how to bake cookies or play some game with her. Is that how you were thinking?”

Blinking, Kylo dropped his head. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“Hey,” Poe lifted his chin. “You’re not fourteen anymore. You’re not trapped there. She was going to grow up the second you got her out of there. And now she is and she’s having a rough time. But no one is going to torture and rape her here. And she has a world of people who love and care about her who are going to help her. Maybe we’ll just have to do it from a distance for a while until we figure it out.”

“That’s not what I want.” Kylo tried to look away but was drawn back to his eyes.

“Yeah, but it’s what you get.”

It wasn’t the answer that he was looking for, but he still nodded and put his head down again.

“Hey, I love you.” Poe whispered into his hair.

“Don’t ever leave me.” He swallowed and ran his hand along the inseam of his jeans. “I’ll…I’ll try to be better. Better to you. Sorry for leaving you alone so much over the break.”

Poe’s hand covered his. “I’m fine on my own, you know that. I hung out with the friends that are here, helped out at the computer lab. It was fine because I knew you’d always come in the door at the end of the day.”

But what if he didn’t one day? “And I would have called if I stayed there.”

“Yeah, reminding me to lock the door and balcony and not let any strangers into the apartment.”

He sighed. “Don’t joke about that.”

“Sorry. I’ll stop. You’re exhausted. Let’s go to bed.”

Licking his lips, he shook his head. “Let’s just sit here for a while.”

Their apartment was quiet and he just drank it in, still trying to rethread the needle of what he needed and what he wanted to do with his life, aside from hurting himself and disappearing.

 

-=-

 

Finn was waiting by her locker at school on Monday. He looked at Rey and grinned, pulling her into a quick hug. She liked his hugs, but today it just felt tedious. His step-father always dropped him off too early and he’d wander the halls and do nothing until she got there. He smelled like sugary cereal and she gripped her stomach, but pretended to just be fixing her sweater. She had been late on purpose getting up in the morning to avoid eating breakfast at the table and had already thrown away the sandwich that Han had made her.

“I thought you were going to skip again today?” He didn’t sound mad when he asked the question. He was just being curious. They’d been texting all night, mostly about how worried Rey was about the college semester ending soon.

She hadn’t seen or talked to Kylo in two months.

Rey took off her backpack and opened it to show Finn. “Kaydel wanted to buy some of my old clothes and stuff that I don’t want anymore. She finally has the money, so I came. Even though I really didn’t want to.”

There had been so many meetings about her attendance, especially after she got home in March. The school was patient at first, but now they had to have more annoying meetings with a social worker, not just with her therapist. Even when Kylo was getting into fights, no one like that ever came to the house. Even after he attacked a man and left him in the hospital, the police seemed to take a step back. No one came and looked around their house, asking too many questions. Or many she hadn’t noticed. She didn’t know and it made her empty stomach growl louder to think about it.

Finn leaned against the lockers, looking at the things that she pulled out. It was mostly clothes, stuff that was too big. But there were a couple of stuffed animals in there too. They were kids' things. Things that she didn’t want to be anymore.

“Are you ever going to forgive him?” he asked, shuffling his feet. “I’m not saying that to be mean or anything, Rey. You’re my best friend and I don’t like how…sad you are.”

She didn’t like it when Finn called her that. Her best friend was Rose, but he had different ideas that didn’t match what she thought. “I’m not that sad anymore. My new therapist is helping me and really understands. He’s really cool and doesn’t get upset when I scream at him.”

“Yeah.” Finn sighed. “That sounds good.”

She folded her arms, leaning against the lockers beside him, waiting for Kaydel and Rose as the rest of the children, the mean ones and the not-so-mean ones, started to arrive. There were so many kids at her school that reminded her of the ones who’d died; she tried to focus on them and ignore the bullies and their savage words. It was another thing that made her think too much; she had no one to talk to about her memories anymore. But she finally heard her friends laughing from down the hall and checked the time. They’d have to go to class soon and she really wanted her money.

“Hi guys,” Kaydel said, waving. “Thanks for the clothes, Rey. Sorry it took me so long to save up so much.”

She shrugged, watching her take out the shirts and sweaters, putting them into a plastic bag. She grinned at the plush dolphin and put it there too. Rey had wanted to burn it but if she could get some money for it, then it would be better.

“I don’t mind. The next time you come over, you can pick some other stuff. I really just want to get some new clothes.” Rey was lying, but her friends nodded.

She opened her locker to put her now almost-empty backpack and heard Kaydel sigh, her exhale rising at the end. Snapping her eyes up, she noticed that she’d forgotten a Polaroid of Kylo and Poe that she’d stuck up there months ago. Swallowing, she let the memory of the day play out in her head. They’d come home during a snowstorm. Kylo looked rattled from the drive, but Poe had laughed off how many times they’d almost crashed. They were taking off their coats in the back door and Kylo started telling him how it wasn’t funny at all, making Poe laugh more. She ran upstairs and got her camera, surprising them in a moment.

“Your brother’s boyfriend is so hot.” Kaydel was tilting her head at the picture. “Your brother too.”

Rey snatched the picture from her locker, angry that she still felt anything for them. “You can have it. For two bucks.”

Kaydel’s eyes went wide and grabbed the money from her pocket. “Thanks so much, Rey!”

Putting the money with the rest of it, in the pencil case at the top of her locker, Rey was just happy to let the picture go.

On her way to class, Kylo texted again: _He’s going to Florida for the summer. It will just be me if you let me come home. Not sure if I want to go with him and leave you alone._

She almost replied before she deleted it and shut off her phone. Her first-period teacher hated her and would take her phone if it made a sound.

 

-=-

 

Kylo stared at his phone, willing her to reply. She hadn’t, for two months. He scrolled up the hundreds of unanswered texts, just to twist the knife in his neck. He told her how much he missed her. He told her how much he loved her. He went over how he never meant to hurt her. But nothing had broken through to her. He let the phone fall from his hand to the floor and sighed, going back to stroking Poe’s hair.

They were watching some movie that Hux had recommended about serial killers. At least he could complain about how inaccurate it was. Fiction could never match the real fear and feelings of being there. They were just people pretending, as Rey used to say when she was small and happy.

“Maybe you should just come with me to my mom’s. Keep giving her some breathing room,” Poe said. He was right. Anything that Kylo did now would just provoke Rey. But the distance and silence had made it hard to focus on exams last week. Now, they were just waiting for the results and trying to figure their summer out.

“That’s what Han thinks. Or at least that’s what he says to me, so I don’t know. But they have so much to deal with right now and I’m not helping. I need to talk to George about this when we see him on Friday, after the talk.” He was drifting off into self-pity again and he deserved to feel that way.

Turning in his lap, Poe reached over to pause the movie and then looked up at him. “I’ll go to the presentation, but maybe you should spend some time alone with him to talk about this.”

“He likes you. You don’t need to worry.” Kylo looked down and frowned. “But I won’t make you do it.”

“We’ll figure it out, Ky.”

Kylo just shut his eyes. There hadn’t been any fights the last two months. There had been more kissing and hugging and slow love making as Kylo tried to get over his guilt. The sweeter days were bringing him out of the haze, helping him focus on studying. But the stressful days, when he spent most of the night crying, made him touch on the emptiness that was growing without having Rey. This wasn’t just when he was lying when he was sixteen and she was still a child, too innocent to admit that him being in a relationship had hurt her deeply from the start. And he’d been too full of himself to realize it.

“Hey, don’t go away.” Poe reached up, stroking his face to make him open his eyes. “She’ll get better, Ky. You wrote that paper that said that puberty is rough on girls, especially traumatized ones. I didn’t understand half of it, but that one guy you cited…

“Kilpatrick?”

“Yeah, that guy. All that stuff about trauma being effected by hormones and shit? Making it worse? It made sense. Too bad that guy didn’t have any answers for us.” Poe’s eyes were still serious. “It’s got to get better, right?”

He still had hope that it would. That wouldn’t die. He reached down to smooth Poe’s eyebrow. “The studies I’ve read say that with enough help and therapy, it might. She’s so strong. Mom and dad are talking about sending her to where Luke is living now, in Michigan, because he’s closer to some doctor that they found and a school for troubled kids. It’s like I was the experiment for them. They never tried to send me anywhere special.”

Poe frowned at him. “Well, they did, Ky. When you were gone, in Virginia, I was bored one night and Rey went to her friends’ after we talked. And mom was up, looking at family pictures and drinking wine. So I sort of starting talking with her, about you and Rey and how weird it must have been to go from no kids to two kids and then three kids in like two years.”

Kylo didn’t like the idea of his mother spilling secrets to Poe, but then again they had nothing to hide from one another anymore. He was all that he had, losing the other half of him because of lies and stubborn decisions. He just nodded, telling him to keep talking. Like he could stop him.

“She said that it was like a dream at first, hearing that you were alive after so long. Like, how they called and she was at work and thought it was a joke. They’d had to look at so many pictures of dead kids that they’d found over the years and none of them was ever you. But then, there you were out in California of all fucking places. And you saved a little girl.” Poe grinned at him, getting lost in his own story. “And then it was just hell for like two years. Ky, they know you tried to kill yourself when you were fifteen. They knew all that and didn’t know what to do with you and Rey all by themselves; but they couldn’t send you away from her. She said they talked about sending you away, to try to get you better. You weren’t going to therapy and were fighting all the time.” His smile faded and he shook his head. “You didn’t do it because of Rey, right?”

“Yes.” He answered quickly, refusing to drag himself down that road again. “I didn’t trust my friends. Everything was weighing on me and I just couldn’t keep my head from suffocating me. If it weren’t for Rey and George, I would have just fucking died and it would have been over.”

“I’m glad that you didn’t.” Poe sat up, resting his head on his shoulder and taking his hand. “But they were looking at places that could handle you, but didn’t want to let you go too far away. They had you back and wanted to keep you there. And you would have felt like you were being sent away from Rey.”

“Then you showed up.” Kylo managed to smile, hoping to change the subject, but failed when the next thought surfaced in his mind. “And I ruined your life and now I’m ruining Rey’s.”

Poe’s fingers tightened in his then loosened. “We can still break up. Or maybe take a break. I’ll go down and spend time with mom and the boys, you talk to your parents and your shrink about what to do with Rey and how to make her feel better.”

“That’s not an option,” he said lowly. But really, it was the only option that they had.

“Okay,” came the reply. “Let’s keep watching this. See if you can solve the crime before the cops.”

Kylo had already figured out who the killer was in the first five minutes, but then again this was just a work of fiction.

 

-=-

 

Finn’s friend Ethan looked at the gaming system, lifting it up to look under it. “Are you sure you only want $50 for this? I mean, it’s all I have but you can probably sell it online for more. When did he get it?”

“Like two years ago. I don’t remember. It’s still good, right?” Rey shrugged, leaning against the wall in Kylo’s room. It was Tuesday afternoon, before mom and dad got home. Mrs Hux was in the kitchen, making them something to eat and she’d have to figure out how to sneak her food onto Ethan’s and Finn’s plates. Maybe she’d ask to eat in her room, but those tricks were harder now. She should have paid more attention to how Kylo could hide so many things.

She was never in Kylo’s space anymore and only brought Finn and Ethan there so they could look at the stupid video game thing. They’d turned it on and saw that everything still worked. Kylo wasn’t logged in anymore. He’d set it up for her to play and she’d only used it twice. “Mom and dad won’t let me. He’s got one at college so he won’t miss it.”

“Also, Rey won’t let him come home ever again.” Finn quipped. He was looking at Kylo’s bookcase. Her eyes found a framed picture of the three of them from some ancient Christmas, back when they all were happy. Stamping over, she flipped the picture down.

“I don’t ever want to see him again. But he can come home. I’ll just be in my room when he’s here.” She folded her arms, trying to calm her heartbeat.

Ethan tilted his head. “So why are you selling his stuff?”

She just shrugged. “I want to buy a new bike.”

He didn’t look like he believed her, but Ethan shrugged and gave her the money. “Thanks so much, Rey. It’s older but mine is broken and I can’t wait until Christmas. And grandma’s birthday money just came in.”

She left them to pack up the cables and cords because she couldn’t be in that room anymore.

It smelled too much like him and her body kept telling her to crawl up onto her side of the bed and imagine his arms around her.

 

-=-

 

Kylo had been refreshing the webpage for a half an hour, waiting for his last grade to come in. They were supposed to be in on Monday, and now it was Tuesday morning. Poe was sitting across from him at the table, still grinning over his cereal about his 3.4 average. Last semester it had been 3.2. During first year, he’d barely made it above 2.9 for both semesters. Now, he was finally on track. At least one thing was going right in his life.

“I still don’t know I pulled that off in calculus,” he said, in between crunching. “The last few months were awful and I thought I flunked that fucking thing.”

He nodded, still distracted by hitting refresh. Finally, the final grade popped up and he groaned. “Fucking 3.9. Fucking anthropology fucks me over again.”

“What?”

Kylo turned the computer, furious at himself.

“I just couldn’t think on the day of that exam. I should have asked for it to be delayed. I thought that that prof liked me too.” He groaned and then shook his head. “It’s okay, for the one Masters program in criminology here that I looked at, they’ll drop your lowest grades. But I can’t mess up next year. And the year after.”

Poe shrugged and turned back to the cereal, before sliding the bowl over to him. Annoyed, Kylo started to eat. “And then no messing up for two more years. Got it.”

He’d said it with a smile in his voice, but Kylo still turned in his chair to disguise his eye roll with the excuse of getting more cereal. “I can still take a break. When we figure out what to do with Rey, once she gets better, I can still…”

Poe was already shaking his head, grabbing the spoon from his hand to take another mouthful of cereal from the same bowl. “Nah, we keep going. They’re always looking for people to work with the IT stuff like I’m already doing now, but then I’d at least get paid. Allison told me. I can work there for a bit until it’s time to go to Virginia and find something better there and have some experience. With Rey.”

Kylo snatched the spoon back and sat back, keeping the bowl out of his reach. “Without Rey, I won’t be able to do it. We’ll figure it out.”

That had been their mantra the last two months. And they still weren’t any closer.

Grinning at him, Poe’s eyes shifted into mischief. “We should go out tonight, to celebrate. Everyone else who’s still here is going to be out. Maybe we can get Hux on board. So you two can complain about not being perfect and I can just enjoy being above average for once.”

“You know that they got engaged right?” It was Kylo’s turn to talk with his mouth full. “Last weekend.”

“No shit.” Poe had his hands folded behind his head, revealing the hint of his stomach. “Just copying us.”

Kylo finished eating and when he was rinsing out the bowl, he noticed the pile of mail sitting on the counter. He’d grabbed it yesterday and Poe had ignored it, like he always did. “You got another letter from your dad.

Tensing, Poe quickly settled his elbows on the table. “You didn’t open it again, did you?”

Back in November, Kylo couldn’t control his curiosity and opened one of the constant letters that they got from Poe’s father in California. He didn’t know how he found their address at first, but they showed up every couple of weeks. Poe finally asked and his mother had told him that she’d done it. Kylo had watched the fury in Poe’s face as he yelled at her; he’d never done that before. Kylo wanted him to calm down, but also felt proud of him. In a twisted way, he was happy that he could be angry at someone else. Then, when he’d opened the letter that he’d retrieved from the trash, that same cutting feeling was aimed at him. His excuses of protecting them never worked, but he shouldn’t have needed an excuse. All he was doing was begging for money; it wasn’t anything private, or asking how his son was doing. He just needed money and he was in trouble. He hadn’t opened another one since, but that fight had been harsh and personal: stop going through his things, stop acting so controlling, stop being paranoid and talk about it instead. Control was the last thing that Kylo felt. Poe’s posture told him how he still carried the words that they shouted at one another with him all of the time and had just learned to hide them.

Shaking his head, he turned and handed him the still-sealed envelope. His posture loosening, Poe smiled at him. “I knew I could trust you. Sorry for…that.”

“No, I understand. Trust is important.”

Smirking at him, his lips looking inviting in the gesture, Poe nodded. “Yeah, that’s what I shouted at you. I’m glad that you remembered it.”

Still, Poe burnt the envelope on the balcony until it was ashes. He stomped out the small fire that they were both enjoying watching and let the remains fall to the ground.

Kylo stared at the small bits of paper as they fluttered to the lawn.

They ended up at a loud bar, where Poe knew the guy working the door. Kylo knew that; he’d seen him going there with his friends several times. Poe still didn’t believe him that he wasn’t following him because he was jealous or because he didn’t trust him. He didn’t understand that there was always someone following them and he had to keep him safe.

Hux was in a good mood for once, carrying a pitcher to their booth. “My best grade was in the hardest course. I’m so fucking thrilled. Pedagogy can go straight to hell and burn.”

Slipping his arm around Poe, Kylo took a long drink from his glass. “My worst grade was in a bullshit course. It’s going to haunt me forever.”

There were plenty of things haunting him. He’d rather focus on the most trivial one.

They had to shout over the music, but eventually the alcohol made it easier to pretend like he’d been listening to the others. He was trying to focus on school rather than worrying about Rey, letting his real thoughts out. Poe kept telling them stories about all of the weird porn that they found on campus computers and how they basically had to ignore it for tenured professors. Hux laughed but Kylo sat back, frowning. Poe gripped his leg; there was always something sexual that made him uncomfortable for no reason. He was fine, they both were. He didn’t need to tense up and be put off from a stupid story.

He let his eyes drift, hoping for a distraction. From the dance floor across the bar, he spotted a blonde girl waving at them intently.

Poe looked at him. He had been watching him, even though his had was still stroking his thigh. “That’s Allison. But you already know that.”

“She wants you to go dance with her,” he leaned over to say, but his eyes stayed on the tall, thin blonde. He’d seen her and Poe studying in the library or eating lunch, when Kylo had said he was busy but wasn’t really. He knew how often they went out together and Poe had given him her phone number. He didn’t ask for it, but was happy to have it. The rest of his friends’ numbers were on his phone too. But Allison was his main object of confusion. Was Poe attracted to her? Why were they friends?He had asked but the answers didn’t make any of his thoughts less aggravating. He’d even met her twice, retrieving Poe from the weird basement office that they had the volunteer IT workers were using. But they still spent too much time together; he had to let that happen if they were going to be together.

“Can I?” He looked almost pleading. It made his stomach tighten. Still, Poe smiled at him, wiping away the look in a flash of teeth. “Do you want to come too?”

Both he and Hux shook their heads in tandem. Kylo tried to smile back at him, desperate to look relaxed as he trailed his hand across his cheek. “We don’t dance.”

Grinning, Poe finished his beer and took off for his friends. The distance hit him in an instant. Guilt followed, like it always did.

“Am I really that bad?” Kylo asked, watching how easily his hands fell on her hips.

“I’m not sure but…” Hux had to lean forward to hear him over the music. “Are you two still fighting? Are you still following him everywhere?”

He shook his head, turning to shift closer to the other man. “We haven’t had a fight since Rey blew up at us. It’s been solid and good, I think. And I don’t follow him as much. Sometimes I start doing it and don’t even realize that I am.”

“That part is really not good, Kylo.” Hux’s tone of voice was telling him more than his words ever could. “Both the following and what happened with Rey. Why didn’t you tell her right away? Text her when you got home and prepare her? You really fucked up and this won’t go away like when we were kids.”

He sadly held his friend’s eyes and nodded. But still needed to hear it again. Whatever made him feel worse. And his silence made Hux keep talking.

“She’s hanging out a lot of the time at Paige’s house and she just moves the food around her plate. She mashes it up and hides it napkins. Her mom is really, really worried. How could you have missed that? You know everything about her.” Hux sounded angry, but Kylo appreciated being told how was wrong he was _again_.

He swept his eyes back out to the dance floor and shook his head. When he turned back, Hux was refilling their glasses. Taking a thick gulp of beer, he stared at the bubbles as they rose in the glass. “I didn’t miss it. I just didn’t want her to think that she wasn’t perfect.”

Hux gripped his shoulder. “Paige is talking to her. She gets like that too and it’s fucking awful. You see how she eats; it’s always small bites. I can only help her so much when she’s here. It’s a lot of work, but there are programs and people she can talk to.”

“How many problems can an eleven year old have?” he asked, absently remembering being eleven and having to take care of an infant under the threat of death. But that was there; this was here.

“It’s…it’s a shitty age,” Hux answered and shook his head.

When Kylo looked back out towards the dancer floor, he’d lost track of Poe. The panic swept over him instantly. He stood, scanning the crowd. He couldn’t find him after two or three sweeps of the room and took off, leaving Hux behind him. He’d only looked away for a moment, trying to be normal and have a conversation. He kept studying the people, trying to find Allison or Poe or his other friends. He couldn’t find him, sending his heart racing until he couldn’t breathe. He scanned the entire open area that he could see: not in the booths or at the tables, not at the bar. The lighting was too low and there were too many people. This is why they shouldn’t leave the apartment. Even together, something could go wrong.

He caught the back of a head leaving out the back exit. And he narrowed his eyes.

It wasn’t Poe, but it was the figure that had always been following them. He was familiar but he couldn’t place where he’d seen him before; it wasn’t Snoke. This wasn’t in his mind. The man was shorter, stockier. He had proof now. He needed to confront the man and see what he wanted from them.

Bursting out the door and into the near-summer air, he saw no one outside of the side entrance.

His hands were shaking. He hadn’t been that slow, pushing by the idiots who didn’t know that he needed to get to that door _now_. The muddy ground was covered in footprints; he couldn’t find anything that would let him know more than he already knew.

Stepping back inside, he smoothed his hair and rubbed his eyes.

“Hey, Ky.” Poe popped into his line of vision. “Hux said you took off, looking for me.”

Pulling him into his arms, Kylo shook his head, breathing in the smell of the bar in his hair.

“I saw someone,” he mumbled.

Poe just sighed. “Come on.”

 

-=-

 

Rey pretended to be sick on Wednesday morning, saying that she thought her period was coming. Leia stayed home, working in her office. Both mom and dad had looked at her with scepticism, but Rey tried her best to lie like Kylo did. Don’t make up too much; just keep it simple and pretend to be sick. He was good at making big lies.

“Mom?” Rey asked, leaning against her doorway.

“Yes, dear?” Mom looked up, taking off her glasses. “Do you want more soup?”

Rey nodded. The chicken broth had been good, but she’d pushed the vegetables and chicken pieces aside and tossed them in the garbage, under a bundle of paper towels. “Can I get it myself?”

“It would be good for you to get out of bed, if you feel like it.” Smiling, Leia nodded. “There are those crackers that you like in the cupboard. Just take as many as you want. You need to have your snack later too, remember.”

Turning, Rey grabbed the tray from her bed and padded downstairs, trying to ignore the idea of having a snack later too.

She started to fill her bowl and spotted her real goal: mom’s purse was on the counter. It was the bag that she’d helped her pick out two years ago. Rey loved that bag; it was perfect and white. Mom let her get a matching one, but smaller. Putting down the soup, she glanced up the stairs, towards the office. In the distance, mom was typing.

Sucking in a breath, she slid the zipper open as quietly as she could. The wallet was right on top, above a make-up bag and an umbrella.

Taking out the matching-white wallet, she carefully opened it. She only took the small bills and was careful to leave one of each behind. It was still $45. Rey eyed the $50 bill that was still sitting at the top and took it too.

Quickly closing the wallet and tucking it back in the purse, zipping it shut with careful hands, she could finally exhale. She hid the money under her napkin and went up the stairs with her tray.

She was eating carefully, dragging the soup slowly across the bottom so it would sound like she was eating more than she was.

“Feeling better?” Mom’s voice knocked her from swirling the spoon along the porcelain.

“I’m just thinking,” Rey answered. It was the wrong thing to say because mom came and sat on her bed. Rey’s eyes were locked on the tiny corner of a bill peaking out from under her napkin. She couldn’t move it. But she had to stop looking at it; mom would notice.

“Ben called again. He really misses you.” Leia sighed, leaning down to talk to her. “He’s worried about you.”

“I’m not worried about him.” She took a big spoonful of soup, chewing the vegetables and chicken and swallowing hard. “I don’t care about him anymore.”

“Rey,” mom was being serious, making her look up, “I’ve talked to them both. Neither of them wanted to keep it a secret, but were worried that you’d feel outshined on your birthday. They’re both adults, Rey. They didn’t do this to hurt you and know that lying is wrong. We’re not asking you to be happy about what they’re doing and what their relationship is. We’re just asking you to let them come home so we can all talk _as a family_ about what’s best for everyone.”

Chewing the inside of her mouth, Rey shook her head. “Poe has another family. He can go stay with them. There are other people that love him now so he can just go away. Mom, Kylo doesn’t really love him. He’s just afraid of being alone and now I’m alone.”

“Sweetheart,” Leia said, then sat back and frowned. She shook her head and reached to move the tray; Rey felt her eyes grow wide, but Leia just set it on the floor. She quickly moved into Leia’s arms and hugged her. “You’re not alone. He still loves you. They both love you. But how they love each other, that’s a different.”

“I feel alone,” she whispered. “I don’t mean to feel like this. I love you and dad so much. I love our house, our dog, my friends, dance class…but why isn’t it enough? Mom, why did Snoke put a hole in me that can’t be filled with all of these nice things?”

“I don’t know sweetheart.” Leia held her tighter. “I don’t know why that man did those things to you, or Ben, or all of those other children. But you’re home here, with us. And those boys love you too. This is our family, Rey. Grandma and Uncle Luke too.”

She sat back and wiped at her eyes, even though she wasn’t crying. “Why doesn’t dad have a family?”

“Well, because he’s been alone for a long time too. His parents died before I met him, when he was fourteen. He’s been working hard his entire life to not feel alone either. When we thought we lost Ben, before we ever knew about you, we also felt alone. There was no one to help us. No one had the answers. Maybe all we ever do as people is try not to feel alone.” Leia paused, reaching out to stroke her cheek. “Everyone feels like you do Rey, just not as much, and they find other people to help them not feel that way. And we’ll keep helping you. Ben and Poe want to help you too. Keep telling these things to your new therapist. Remember he’s coming tomorrow.”

Rey still frowned, pulling back to rest against her pillows. “I heard them having sex the last time I was there.”

Exhaling, Leia shook her head. “They shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry, Rey. We always tried to keep that part from you, or at least help you understand what they were doing. God, how we tried. Rey, we didn’t want to keep this from you; some of the books say one thing, some of the books say another thing. But like I told you then, if they felt ready and really cared about one another, and used protection, then they could explore that part of their relationship. But it was very inappropriate that they did that and I’ll tell him that the next time he calls. Which will be soon.”

“When can I have sex?”

The question sat thick in the air, like the words hadn’t left her mouth but were still just in her head.

Leia licked her lips, but didn’t look mad. “Well, do you have a boyfriend?”

“No.” She pouted as she spoke.

“Do you want a boyfriend?”

“Kind of.”

Leia shifted again, moving closer to her. “Well, let me give you two stories here so you can decide which one you think sounds better. When I was about your age, maybe a little older, my mother—grandma—sat down with me and said ‘Leia, you’re a pretty girl, and pretty girls should know this. A boy will promise you the world to have sex with you. And you should want more than the world and more than a boy.’ And I think that still makes sense for you. You’re very pretty, Rey, and boys will say things that they probably don’t mean to feel better about themselves. But, my other story is the one I told Kylo and Poe. When you find someone who you respect, and respects you back, when you trust one another and can talk about anything and everything, then have sex and deal with how awkward it is afterward.”

Rey’s eyes widened. “Did they say that it was awkward?”

Chuckling, Leia shook her head. “As if they’d tell me. And Rey, it’s like we talk about in therapy. Sex is something that you do not just to please another person, but because you’re there as equals. When you’re a bit older, when you feel like you can talk to a boy like we’re talking now, then maybe you’ll be ready. But always come to us first, just in case you’re getting carried away without knowing better and might be doing stupid things because you like someone.”

“Like Kylo did.”

“Yes.” Leia pursed her lips. “And we still don’t think he should have taken you that night.”

Rey liked revisiting that night. She got to make up her own mind and followed Kylo into danger. She thought she understood what a boyfriend was and would rather still have those childish thoughts than the ones that she had now. Kylo just needed a friend; she never thought that he’d take him away from her.

“I went because I had too. I just thought I could keep going.”

“Sweetie, we need to figure out what’s happening at school. And with your eating. How to make you feel better all of the time. And if you can forgive them, we’d love to send you back when you have more of these bad thoughts figured out. Okay?” Leia tucked a strand of hair behind her ear.

Rey nodded. “I’ll think about it. When I’m not feeling so sick.”

“Well, your soup is cold. Do you want me to warm it up?”

Rey sat up. “No. I like it better this way.”

Leia nodded and left her alone and Rey could finally climb down from her bed to get her money and hide it with the rest of it in her pencil case.

 

-=-

 

Kylo sighed, nuzzling closer to Poe. It was early on Thursday morning, probably around 8 a.m. They woke up on the couch together an hour earlier, too drunk to make it to the bed last night. Kylo always found it easier to have sex in the morning, when he was just waking up and still couldn’t remember who he was or how he’d fucked up so many people. It felt so innocent, hearing Poe gasp beneath him in the heated moments from only an hour ago. He was still living those sounds as he stirred in his arms.

“The cat is hungry,” Poe said, lifting his head to kiss him. “And you’re too big for this couch. I’m all curled up in the corner here getting crushed.”

“It’s your cat.” He smirked in response. “Get up and feed him so we can go to bed.”

Groaning, Poe shifted over him, purposely elbowing him in the stomach as he went. He pulled on his shorts and grimaced at Kylo. He’d grabbed whatever he could to clean up afterwards.

“Thanks, asshole. I’m going to shower after this. Come join me?” He still met his eyes with a raised eyebrow, despite wiping their combined semen onto a kitchen towel.

Kylo sat up, stretching his neck. They had stopped using condoms years ago, both satisfied that there would never be anyone else. They were together, but as long as Rey hated them he couldn’t let go of the last of his guilt. Poe was talking with Bee in Spanish, telling him how much he loved him and how special he was. How they weren’t bad daddies just because he didn’t get to eat everything that he wanted all of the time. He sat down, spooning wet food into a bowl and the cat still buzzed around him, ignoring it until he got a kiss on the head. Poe looked up and met his eyes and shrugged.

“So what? You talk to him too. I really need to shower. Clean up the couch a little before the hot water runs out.” He sounded serious, but he was mostly joking. Except for wiping down the couch.

Kylo, still lingering in his hangover, managed not to kick Bee as he grabbed the cloth from the kitchen. He did the best that he could but thought about getting a new couch for the start of the next semester. This one was still a little too small, but it was still better than their first couch.

He picked up their clothes and put them in the laundry basket in the main washroom. He put the covers from the throw pillows in there too, along with the light blanket they’d left there for whoever had to sleep on the couch when one couldn’t stand the other.

But it hadn’t been like that in so long.

Checking his face in the mirror, he realized that he needed to shave.

Poe was in their washroom, running the water too hot already.

“Hey,” Poe said, turning as he stepped over the tub and behind the shower curtain. “Thanks for the good morning. And sorry for bitching at you right after.”

Pulling him into a wet kiss, Kylo leaned in closer. “No, it was good. I’m okay.”

Still in his arms, Poe kissed his shoulder, his hands running up his back. “You’re freaking out less lately. Is it weird that I’m worried about you not being freaked out?”

Letting his mind wander, he leaned closer, embracing how alone they were in that moment. It was something delicate. It wasn’t fighting until they were both red in the face and in pain or arguing about who did what wrong: who forgot to buy what; who forgot to feed the cat; who was hurting Rey more by being there and doing what he wanted. “Maybe don’t get used to it.”

“Yeah?” Poe smirked, pulling back to meet his eyes. The water pinned his loose curls against his forehead. “I won’t. But I know things are shitty and up in the air right now, but I love you. We’re not going to be okay until Rey is too, but you still love me, right?”

“Of course I do.” Kylo narrowed his eyes at him. “Why wouldn’t I love you?”

“No idea.” Smiling, Poe shrugged. “Let’s just shower. I’ll tell you later.”

He was shaving after, still mulling over the question; Poe was making breakfast. He could smell something burning and just ignored it. He couldn’t be mad about every little thing. He needed to stop following him around, but whoever was after them was probably going to show up again and he needed to be ready. No more alcohol for a while.

He was dressed for the day, but Poe was still in pyjama pants.

“Sorry that it’s all fucked up. I tried. But I suck at so much.” He put the pan of eggs directly on the table and Kylo had to reach back to grab a cork form to put under it. “Sorry about that too.”

They ate and Kylo started to feel growing nerves at how quiet he was being.

“What’s wrong?”

Poe lifted his shoulders, keeping his eyes down. “I booked my ticket for Florida yesterday, before we went out. I go on Monday. My mom paid for it. I’m tired of using your parents’ money, but my mom has money now too so she wants me to be there. And now that my grades are good, I can apply for those scholarships. Mom can help a bit there too. Your parents and you don’t have to take care of me so much.”

His parents were helping them to a point, but most of it was because of what he’d been through. And he was the one making sure that they had a safe place to live where no one would hurt them.

Blinking, Kylo put his fork down. “They still want to help us. That fund is for you too.”

“I know, I know. But Ky, I feel like the biggest dick on the planet whenever I see you text Rey and then frown into oblivion when she doesn’t answer. Driving across the state just to get a door slammed in your face. I think about what she said to us and what idiots we were for not telling her right away. I want to marry you. I love you. But we haven’t been apart for longer than a week in so long. What, six weeks of you being in Virginia when I was 17? That first summer when I was 15? When I go see my family, it’s only been for a week here and there. I want you all of the time and it’s not your fault that it took you a while to catch up.” Poe licked his lips and then started eating again. That only made Kylo more nervous.

“You want to break up.”

“That’s _not_ what I’m saying. I’m just saying…some time apart. Let us both breathe. And you can go home and take care of Rey and say that it was my idea and maybe get me in her good books for a bit, you know?” Poe had pushed his plate aside and reached for his hand. “Ky, things have been better when it’s just been us, but she’s everything. You saved her. She’s always going to be tied to you and only you. I tried my best and, bam, that just blew up in my face.”

Kylo squeezed Poe’s hand like he thought it would disappear. “So we’re not breaking up, but taking some space?”

“Yeah, just to…I’m not going to sleep with anyone else when I’m away. I’ll just be at my mom’s house, taking care of the boys. She’ll probably make me get a job to make sure I’m not getting lazy from all of the white-people money. And Ky, I’ve got this,” he pulled away, lifting up his hand, “No one’s going to try to pick me up and if they do, I’ll tell them to fuck off. It’s just for a couple of months. We’ll talk everyday. And it will just be you and Rey for the summer. Like it was that first summer.”

Slowly breathing out, Kylo focused on the ring. He’d spent too much time trying to figure out the size and what kind to buy rather than what it meant. “You’re not leaving me?”

“Ky, no. Go home to your parents. Talk to Rey. Let’s just…not think about it for now. It’s on the table, but don’t go overthinking it. Have a weekend together. Flesh it out on Sunday night? Wait until the last minute like we usually do?” Poe was trying to be kind and reached out to take some eggs from his plate. “It’ll just be the summer. And then we’ll be back together.”

“And you won’t be with anyone else?” Kylo was ignoring Poe’s fork, poking around on his plate on his side of the table. “Please.”

The echoes of Allison’s hands around Poe’s neck flashed in his mind.

“You’re the only person who I’ve ever really been with. I messed around a lot before we met, but just thinking about anyone else…no. Never. The good, the bad, you’re all there is for me.” He tilted his head. “Ky, I love you and…maybe I just need to stop being in the way for a while.”

“I love you too.” It was all Kylo could say. “Let’s just…okay. Let’s have a weekend. Tomorrow, George will be here and then it will just be us. I can talk to him and figure some more things out.”

“Great. Greatness.” Poe exhaled and Kylo finally saw how tense he had been by how he moved easier after he breathed out. “Bee needs his shots and we have the vet appointment at one. Let’s do nothing for a while and then maybe you can take me for lunch at that weird Vietnamese place we saw last time? And then we take him home and do nothing the rest of the day?”

He swallowed. “Sounds like a good plan.”

They ate the rest of their breakfast in silence. Kylo texted Rey _I think he wants to break up with me._

He managed not to cry until he was alone, punching another hole in the pantry wall as he pretended to look for more paper towels.

 

-=-

 

Dr. Windu was so much different than Ahsoka. He was tall and seemed mean at first. But back then, she wanted someone to be mean to her. It would teach her how not to be so nice to everyone.

He had come over for dinner on Thursday night. Rey ate so she could make him believe that she was eating like that all of the time. She liked cooking, but hated eating. She hated feeling full and fat and lazy. Tomorrow, she’d go for a run before school, or maybe sneak out and run around the track to avoid stupid first period. Tomorrow would be the start of everything.

Mom put the teapot down on the coffee table and nodded at them before going back to her office to work. Han was in the garage. Everything looked normal and she hoped that Dr. Windu would think the same. The social worker had been by again that week and said that everything still looked good. Han and Leia were working less and Kylo hadn’t been by. Things were stable. Maybe they would stop coming if he kept away.

“Have things been better this week, Rey? You only missed school yesterday.” He sipped at his tea, sitting back and looking at her.

“I thought I was sick yesterday. But I wasn’t. Sometimes I still get the pains in my stomach. But they’re getting better.” She shrugged, shifting her teacup in its saucer.

“Hmm…don’t lie to me, Rey. We agreed on that a month a go. You don’t lie to me and I don’t lie to you. And then we’ll have a good relationship.” He looked serious, his face getting intimidating. “Right?”

“Yeah.” She didn’t mean it, but wanted him to believe it. “Yes, I know.

“We’re going to talk about Kylo now. Is that all right?”

She shrugged. “He’s been texting me all day. How his dumb boyfriend is going to break up with him. He’s trying to make me feel bad about it and make me think that it’s my fault. I’m going to be happy when they break up because then Kylo will be alone too.”

Windu sipped at his tea. “Okay, I want you think about how he’s feeling right now about this. Don’t think about how you feel, or how you _think_ he wants you to feel. Think like he would.”

Exhaling, Rey reluctantly put herself into Kylo’s head. She had to push through thicker anger this time; everything was so clouded with the last few months of building up a wall around her feelings for him and about him. “He’s afraid of being alone. He’s afraid of dealing with all of the things that he’s done wrong and facing them. And he’s afraid that if someone isn’t there, he might kill himself because I hate him right now.”

“That sounds very serious, Rey. Despite how you feel about him right now, you still care about him. Correct?” Dr. Windu’s voice didn’t change, but he did put down his cup. She couldn’t figure out what that meant.

Frowning, Rey slammed the door on her pathway to Kylo’s thoughts and folded her arms. “I wouldn’t be so mad if I didn’t care.”

“And your parents know this?”

“My parents are dead.”

He cleared his throat. “Let me correct myself: your _current_ parents know what’s going on?”

She shook her head. “He only talks to them about me. They don’t even know how much they argue. When I was there, Poe was just pretending to care about me so I can't trust what he told me. Kylo used to tell me all the time about the things that they argued about. Then he stopped because he wanted me to think that he actually loves him.”

Dr. Windu took another long sip of his tea. “How often did you argue with him?”

“When I got mad,” Rey answered. “When he was lying. That’s why I got so mad that they didn’t tell me about getting married. That means Poe has him forever.”

But she knew what divorce was. And she knew that people argued all of the time got divorced. But Kylo still got whatever he wanted and Poe was too stupid to ever leave him.

The thoughts were getting to be too much and her lip started to quiver.

“What does forever mean?”

She glared at him. “What?”

He punctuated each of his words. “What does forever mean?”

She couldn’t roll her eyes. He hated that. Instead, she folded her legs underneath her and thought about the question. “It means…forever. Like, a long time.”

He folded his hands, tipping them at his mouth. He wasn’t impressed.

Frowning, she dropped her head. “It means that I’ll always have to share Kylo. I still…I guess I still want to live with Kylo, but only him. I want to be mad at him for a long time for this lie. If he came to get me now, I wouldn’t go with him. But maybe when my stomach stops hurting and I stop feeling alone, I’ll want to see him again. And give him a hug. I don’t really want him to kill himself because Poe is done with him. That part isn’t my fault. It’s all of Kylo’s mistakes.”

“But you make mistakes too, Rey. Right?”

Pulling her legs up under her chin, she shook her head. “Not like Kylo. Sometimes I’m mean, but not because I hate other people. Maybe they were mean to me first, or I’m having a bad day. He could be mean for no reason. And he was mean for not telling me that he wants forever with someone else.”

Sighing, Dr. Windu looked at her with his dark eyes. “But aren’t you a part of that forever too?”

Rey bit her lip. She didn’t want to start believing that she was part of what Kylo had planned anymore.

Hope would keep her from doing what she wanted to do.

 

 

-=-

 

“I don’t know what to do, George. I’ve already lost her. I can’t lose him.” Kylo’s hands were firmly around his water glass, staring at it to avoid seeing the look on the agent’s face.

It was well after dinner on Friday, before 8 p.m., and Kylo had said all of the praise he could about the talk that Agent Jinn had given. The auditorium wasn’t as full as he thought it would be, but he saw many of his classmates there. They only came up to talk to him when he was standing next to George afterwards, speaking with one of his professors. Kylo hadn’t felt calm all day until he saw George that afternoon before the talk. Poe kept gripping his leg during it. He’d noticed how quiet he’d been since their conversation yesterday, and had just repeated that it would just be for the summer. It would be okay. Fix things with Rey and then be together again.

“Well, Kylo,” George was speaking so he had to meet his eyes and sit up. “When was the last time you talked with him about what he wanted? You surprised him with an engagement that you said that you’d never discussed before and then asked him to lie by omission to Rey. What does he want to do with his life?”

But they did talk about these things. They talked about being together; that meant getting married. And Poe had basically said that he’d be fine doing nothing for a while after school. His degree would be useful too, when he was done school. It was true that he knew that Poe hated studying and wanted to have more freedom. But had he really asked him to lie to Rey?

He was about to speak when George raised his hand. “And if your next words are going to be ‘be with me’ then I think that you should reconsider them. What does your fiancé want to do with his life?”

He knew that his mouth snapped shut too quickly and put his head down. “We’ve been talking about something in IT. He does some part-time stuff on campus. It’s not exactly his dream job, but he likes solving problems and telling people what they did wrong.”

“What’s his degree in?”

Of course he knew. He helped him plan his course schedule.

“Physics and math,” Kylo replied. “He’s always been good at it, even though he thinks he’s not.”

“How often do you talk about how he’s feeling?”

“All of the time.” Kylo felt himself tensing and tried to shake it off. George was asking important questions that he should answer truthfully. “When I’m not a mess.”

Sighing, George took a long drink from his wine glass. “I’ve always been honest with you, haven’t I? So you have to trust me right now. If you want to be an agent and work with me, you need to handle a lot of stress and show that you’re capable of that on the psychological exam. I can only help you so far in getting prepared, but controlling your anger issues and your depressive episodes, along with your interpersonal skills, are amongst a dozen other things standing in your way. If you want a stable partnership, you need to talk and not just after you’ve had a fight or argument. Fights won’t happen if you communicate before about what you’re both feeling. That goes for you and Rey as well. You messed up, I understand that, but you can start working on that relationship with her once you realize how and why you messed up.”

Kylo wanted to get angry, but just nodded instead. What Agent Jinn had just told him was real and honest and made more sense than he wanted to admit. “Thank you. I needed to hear that. And I’m already working on all of those things. I’ll be ready in four years. I won’t let you down.”

“You rarely have.” George smiled and finished his wine.

And Kylo felt a little better about the future.

He walked Agent Jinn back to his on-campus hotel, embracing him and thanking him again for the talk and the dinner. He had to go to the gym, to work off the annoyance and stress from the last week.

It was a warm evening. It was almost summer. It was almost time to deal with being alone again.

8.15 p.m.

Swiping his keycard, he glanced around the entrance to the building and lifted his bag. He’d felt dumb carrying around his gym bag to dinner and at the talk; it was hard to fit under his seat. But he just forced through with what he wanted. There were only a few students across the way, smoking outside of the math library. No shadows. Maybe he’d stop seeing them if he worked harder at therapy. Maybe everything would get better if he quit lying to himself.

Lingering in the entrance, he slipped off his shoes and texted Poe.

_At the gym. Be home at 10._

_Really? How was dinner? Mine was great, but I sure did miss you. Miss me?_

_Sorry. Of course I missed you. How was your night?_

_Pretty great. Saw the guys and Ally. Had some beers. Going to do finish the laundry soon. It should be done by the time you get home._

_Okay._ He paused, his thumb hovering over send, then quickly added _Thank you._

_No problem. Love you._

“Hey, Kylo.” Another voice broke his concentration and he looked up and pocketed his phone instead of replying. Arthur was across the floor, on the other side of the check-in desk, waving. “How’s it going, man?”

“Good,” he answered. Everyone was always bothering him to make new friends. He was almost there with Arthur. He would sometimes spot for him, but tonight he just wanted to run his frustrations away.

They changed together and Kylo kept the conversation going about his grades and the talk that he’d been to. He wasn't trying to distract him, but more himself. He’d seen his scars before. They had faded over time, but some of them were thick and rigid and would never go away. It just looked like he’d been in fights, he decided. He could play that role. But his forced conversation didn’t lead anywhere. Arthur didn’t care that much about school; he never had. He was on the lacrosse team and changed the subject to some party they were going to have that weekend as they left the locker room.

“You should come. Bring your girlfriend. She’d like it, I’m sure.”

Biting his lip, Kylo nodded. Why hadn’t they talked about this before? Because Kylo kept secrets from everybody. “It’s actually a he.”

“Oh,” Arthur quirked his head. “That’s okay too, you know. A couple of guys on the team are out too. It’s easier to be at a smaller school, I guess.”

The weight on his chest shifted lightly, and Kylo managed to give him a light smile. “I’ll ask him when I get home. He goes here too. You’ve probably at least heard him. Shorter than me, dark hair, talks all the time and makes annoying comments. He probably asked to change the music and danced to it.”

Arthur laughed. “Oh, you’re Dameron’s boyfriend. Okay, I get it now.”

“Get what?” Why did he have to be such a thick jock? Kylo thought, his splash of good mood fading in almost an instant.

“Why he talks about you all the time. This one chick tried to pick him up and he stopped for like fifteen minutes to show her pictures of, I guess, you. I think there’s still a chance for a threesome there.” Arthur winked.

Hiding his disgust at sharing Poe in anyway, he forced a smile to fit in with the environment. “I guess I’ll ask him that too.”

When he was left alone at his machine, Kylo could finally run in peace, listening to music and feeling his legs burn on a track that led nowhere. Dealing with Rey hadn’t led anywhere: his parents wanted him to stop texting her and talk through them. Maybe she was open to seeing him again, but that was just a maybe. His and her therapists and his parents suggested a neutral meeting place, at a spot where Rey would feel comfortable but still give her space to leave if she didn’t want to talk. She was hurting and he’d caused it. She wasn’t healthy and was missing school because of how he’d lied to her again and how he couldn’t protect her enough in the past, in their old life there.

He’d let Snoke touch her, hurt her. If he hadn’t done anything, he’d have taken her from him.

And Kylo was just like Snoke by pushing her away and drawing her into torment.

His anger pushed him faster until he needed to slow his pace again, his lungs burning.

Settling into a slower jog, he thought about what George had told him about Poe, opening the next box in his already flailing emotions. He really was taking up too much space in the relationship. But he did listen to Poe. He was worried about the twins and how his mom was coping with them in daycare. How much he missed them and wanted them to go to Florida to see them again more often and not be worried about him while he was gone. He was watching his brothers grow up from so far away and missed them. That was Kylo controlling him, keeping him away from what he wanted. Like with following him, he was being unfair and hurtful.

Space might be good for them. He could focus on Rey and Poe could decide what he wanted to do for a change.

He felt right about himself as he finally left the machine and checked his phone.

9.30.

But no follow-up texts. He rolled his eyes and put his phone back into his pocket. Poe could punish him too.

Quickly towelling off and changing, he avoided talking to Arthur again. He always showered at home. Changing in front of others was almost okay now, but showering always put him off and sent his shoulders rigid. Poe would be there and he could shower and then they could watch a movie. That’s how normal Fridays worked, but this was an important one. There wouldn’t be this routine again until the fall. He knew that tonight he wouldn’t be able to see past the opening credits of the movie before he’d want to hold him, be inside him.

Sex wasn’t a punishment anymore. Sex was what connected them.

9.45.

He’d timed it right and would be home exactly at ten. He didn’t care about being late to most things, but getting home on time meant that he was consistent. Poe wanted him to come home. He could keep that the same. He needed to be better, talk more about what he wanted to do. The walk around the buildings behind campus was swift and clear. He always enjoyed the walk; the streets were well-lit and he could watch how anyone moved.

9.58.

Glancing at his phone, he took off his headphones when he reached the front door. He was tired and still sweaty from the gym and looked forward to being clean again.

Climbing up the first-floor stairs, he was still scratching at the lingering dampness in his hair when he heard a cat meow.

Their cat.

Bee sat at the top of the staircase, surrounded by a mess of their clothes and an overturned laundry basket.

He took the final few stairs in two strides and his breath caught in his throat. Their door was ajar and there was a smudge of blood on the knob.

All feeling left his arms and his heart thundered in his ears as he reached for the door.

 

-=-

 

Rey heard mom and dad’s door close and quietly shifted out of bed.

She had to make sure she was as quiet as she could be, like before when Snoke was always listening for them to move.

Her backpack was under the bed; she’d hidden it there after school, after she’d dumped out all of the dumb books and useless homework on her desk. Why did Kylo think that school would help? That school was just filled with bullies and mean people. Her friends were nice; they helped. But they didn’t stop the older kids from shoving her and calling her fat or stupid. Or a rape baby. Or how her brother was a psycho, or a homo, or everything mean that they could come up with.

She couldn’t be there anymore. She was going to explode and take everyone down with her in the flames if she didn't leave.

The bus for the station left at 9 p.m. and then that bus would leave at 9.30 p.m. She had enough money for both, finally having saved enough. Her heart had felt lifted because mom and dad had looked exhausted that night so they wouldn’t be checking on her. She’d actually talked at dinner, letting them know how Dr. Windu had helped her work through how she could talk to Kylo. She still needed to decide when, but she was ready.

And they bought her lies. It made the hairs on her arm stand on end.

She looked at the address for her grandparents in California again and nodded to herself. She had asked Agent Jinn a week ago about her family, apologizing for not emailing him in so long. He’d said it was okay, but maybe she wasn’t ready for that information yet. Still replying politely, Rey thanked him for answering and that she understood. She found the information instead by looking up her last name, the real one. She didn’t want to be a Solo anymore; she had never really been. She found some people that she was sure were her grandparents; one had the same name as her dad. It had to be them. She just had to take the bus to Albany, and then the train to Chicago. Then she could get to California.

She felt bad for not saying goodbye to Lumpy, or mom and dad, but she’d hugged them all before she went to bed. They would be okay. It wasn’t like she mattered that much anyway. She was just a bit of dust that was attached to Kylo as he was swept back into their lives. Other people had forgotten her, so maybe that would happen again. No one would remember her if she went away. Everyone was so mad at her and felt bad all of the time. If she wasn’t there, they’d have fewer problems.

 _Remember your snack, Rey._ Maybe she didn’t want a snack because it was just making her fatter and maybe that’s why Kylo didn’t want her anymore and why everyone was always mad at her. And why everything hurt all of the time. If she was smaller, then maybe she wouldn’t feel so much and she would be less sad.

 _Rey, come and watch this with me and tell me what you think._ Dad always tried to trick her into talking about her feelings with movies or television. She was tired of talking about pretend emotions as a way of talking about real ones.

 _Want to help me make dinner and tell me about your day?_ She just wanted to make dinner without help or talking. Why couldn’t everyone just leave her alone?

It was only about her because she was the problem. But Kylo had made her that way by choosing someone else.

He’d made a promise and he’d broken it.

Sliding open her bedroom window, she crept out onto the ledge. Kylo had shown her how easy it was to climb out that window when she was seven. She blocked Poe from the memory and enjoyed the feeling of Kylo guiding her out and showing her how to climb down the house and onto the lawn. He had a harder time going out his window, but hers was easier. He’d tried it when he was a kid and knew how to find the right spots to use.

When she reached to close the window, she slipped and bumped her chin. Blood quickly spilled onto the ledge and she had to ignore it and keep climbing. Mom and dad wouldn’t notice that she was gone until morning anyway. She’d be halfway to California by then.

Finally on the ground, she pulled a bandage from her purse. The cut wasn’t that big, but it still looked stupid to have a plaster on her chin.

She had to run to catch the local bus, but made it on time.

Everything was going perfectly, except for the fact that she fell.

She never understood why Kylo didn’t try to run away ever. He could have done it at anytime. The only time that he tried to run away was just because of _Poe_ and never because of anything that he felt. He was too afraid of strangers, she thought as she looked around the bus at everyone there. She knew who was scary and who wasn’t by now. She knew to sit near older women so they’d feel sorry for her. She’d done it many times when she took the bus to the mall because Kylo wasn’t around to drive her there.

The bus finally pulled up to the station and she started with her plan.

Breathing in and out, she stood up taller. She had to look older. She knew that. She just needed to get away. The entire week had felt like a black cloud and the skies had to clear.

She picked the window with a woman. Women were always nicer, or at least she could talk to them more until they understood what she wanted.

“Can I have a ticket to Albany please?” She’d practiced the words so many times and her voice sounded confident.

The woman leaned back and frowned at her. “I’m sorry, sweetheart. You’re not old enough.”

“But you didn’t even check.” And she was old enough. She was a woman now. She could take the bus by herself. “But I have to. Please.”

Sighing, the woman leaned forward again. “You need to be at least thirteen to travel alone and go out of state. And you need your parents to fill out a form. I’m really sorry.”

Rage was easy to find, but so were anger and sadness. She couldn’t yell at this woman. But she needed to get out of here. The hole inside threatened to grow wider as she bit her lip.

“But,” she started, pushing back tears. “But my brother just dropped me off. He told me that he didn’t want to take care of me anymore. My parents are dead and I have nowhere to go.”

The woman looked at her long and hard. Rey’s heart lifted for a moment when she reached for her keyboard, but then stopped. “There are rules here that I have to follow. But if you’re alone, then I can call someone to help you find your brother. I need to call the police and…”

Rey bolted then, her plans quickly falling apart. But she had the money. This should have worked. She had saved enough for a ticket. Why wasn’t she old enough? Why wasn’t anything _ever_ fair? She stomped her feet and tears came to her eyes. Even as she tried to blink them away, they wouldn’t stop.

“Hey, are you okay?”

She looked up and a pretty girl in a blue coat was the source of the voice. She was smoking a cigarette. At least Kylo and Poe never smoked, but this girl looked nice anyway.

“It’s fine,” she answered, sitting down on the curb. “They wouldn’t let me buy a ticket.”

The girl shrugged and Rey was trying to figure out how old she was. She was tall and thin and had beautiful green eyes. “Well, that sucks. Where are you trying to go?”

“To my grandparents in California,” she replied, hugging her knees. She shouldn’t be talking to someone who she didn’t know. But the hint of green in the girl’s eyes reminded her of one of the kids back there. It was easy to imagine that the girl hadn’t really died and escaped somehow. Rey felt herself being drawn into that fantasy and couldn’t let it go. “I just want to see them.”

Sitting down beside her, the girl nodded. She smelled bad, but Rey tried to ignore it. Escaping Snoke meant going through bad things. She probably didn’t have that much money. Kylo got so much money because he could come home to nice parents. Maybe the other kids never got that. Rey was searching for the girl’s real name as she started to speak. “That sucks that they won’t let you go alone. But they’re assholes like that. I always had to get my parents to fill out a dumb form for the bus or the train. And they need so much information. Totally unfair.”

“My name is Rey,” she said carefully.

“Hi, I’m Casey.” She snuffed out her cigarette and reached for her hand. Her fingers were boney in her grip. “It seems like you had a rough night.”

Rey frowned and Casey pointed at her chin.

It made Rey blush. “I fell. Earlier.”

“That’s okay. I fall down all of the time.” Casey smiled. Now that she was closer, Rey could see how thin she was and how yellow her teeth were. She smelled acidic, something toxic. Her hair had looked beautiful from a distance, but close up it was dirty and oily, like Kylo’s when he spent all day in bed.

She hadn’t escaped Snoke. She was just a hurt person. Who was probably out to hurt other people.

Kylo wasn’t there to save her. So she had to save herself.

“It’s okay.” Rey tried to shrug. “I just wanted to go somewhere.”

“Well,” Casey leaned back, “I might be able to help you. My boyfriend is going to pick me up soon. You can try at the train station. Maybe you can at least get to a ticket that way.”

Rey tried to ignore how strange Casey looked and latched on to how she sounded. Her voice meant that she wanted to help her. Maybe she didn’t need to think so wrong about her after only a few minutes by how she looked. Kylo always judged people instantly. She couldn’t be like him. She had to find her own way. “Could you go with me? Take me to Albany?”

Casey laughed. “I kind of have a night planned, Rey, but maybe I can help you get a ticket.”

Nodding, Rey smiled. Kylo wouldn’t trust a girl like Casey. But she’d been hurt too. She’d been in pain too. Kylo ignored how girls felt, except for her. He didn’t understand how much it hurt to be a girl. He didn’t know how much it hurt to re-remember what Snoke had done to her. He’d bit her where only people who she trusted could touch her. He’d shoved his fingers inside of her and she didn’t understand what was happening. It hurt more when she thought about how Kylo had made her forget all of that. Maybe Casey knew too.

A car pulled up in front of them. It looked like a nice car, like one that mom would drive.

The guy that got out of the car finally made her listen to the distant warning bells she’d been ignoring the entire time. He was skinny too; his teeth were bad when he smiled. She should have felt this earlier. She should have listened to Kylo. He didn’t trust strangers for a reason. He had taught her this and in her anger at him she’d been pushing it away.

She needed him so much right then.

And she’d left her phone at home.

“I just remembered,” Rey said, suddenly standing. “I can call my friend to come help me. It’s okay. Thanks for helping, Casey.”

“Are you sure, Rey?” Casey reached for her hand and Rey pulled away.

“Yes, I’m fine.” Rey smiled again, forcing it. “Thanks for helping me.”

She turned and fled inside the station, going towards the payphones. She pretended to put in some money and dial. Not wanting to turn around, she listened to every person who came into the station and hoped that it wouldn’t be them.

When she finally turned to look out the window, they were gone.

She hung up the payphone and gripped the straps of her backpack.

Where could she go now?

She didn’t want to go home; she’d left that place. She couldn’t get a ticket; that was useless. She was still just a stupid kid. That’s why Kylo didn’t want her. She was still too young and stupid. He just wanted Poe, who could at least get a train ticket and do what he wanted. He only wanted to do college things and get married. Her anger made it easier to leave the station and look around. There were more strangers there, lurking and looking at her.

Gritting her teeth, she started walking towards the bus stop again. She was really too hungry to think. She knew that the older kids hung out at the diner downtown. If she went there, then maybe she’d see someone who she knew. Maybe they could help her get a ticket.

Breathing in and out, she took off her backpack and gripped it to her chest. Now she was looking at everyone like they wanted to hurt her. Why couldn’t Kylo just leave her alone? His stupid ideas only made her hurt.

The bus ride felt endless and she was tired. As her head touched the window, she thought for a second about going home. She wouldn’t even have been missed. But that thought made her shake away her compulsion. Of course she wouldn’t be missed either way.

As the bus creaked to a stop outside of the diner, it only reminded her of bedsprings and her next idea of calling Kylo died in that instant.

It was warmer inside. It was after 10 p.m. but there were still so many people in the building. None of them were the kids from school and she tried to push beyond that. She could do anything. Kylo had taught her that; she was capable of what she wanted to do. Even though she hated him and his stupid boyfriend and how they had disgusting sex, she could look at the good parts. She straightened her shoulders, trying to look taller and older, trying to approach the counter. But her resolve was starting to break. She couldn’t get anywhere or do anything on her own. She’d always be tied to Kylo as long as she stayed there.

“Rey?” A strange voice shook her from the doorway and she stepped aside.

A blonde woman waved at her, smiling brightly. She kept waving, ignoring the two men with her. The man at the counter was glaring at her so Rey forced her feet to move.

“Hey, it is you, wow.” She grinned, flipping her hair. “Do you want to sit down?”

Her mind finally clicked into place and she sighed. “You’re Liza.”

“Yeah!” Liza’s eyes seemed to sparkle as she pointed to her friends. “This is Mike and Andrew. This is the little sister of my friend from high school. He was a total asshole but she was always so nice.”

Rey bit her lip, wanting to correct her but the lie might as well be true at this point. The two men waved lightly, looking mostly like they wanted to ignore her. Rey tried to smile, but slumped down at the table. She was just a little kid again

“Hey, do you want some fries? I couldn’t eat them all.” Liza slid over a cold basket of fries and Rey started picking at them, taking careful bites. “Anyways, how’s Kylo? I haven’t seen him since graduation.”

Rey tilted her head. “Don’t you go to college too?”

Laughing, Liza shook her head. “I quit after one year. It was so boring. Everyone pretended that they knew what they were doing and it was just too much. I liked the parties, but my dad got me a job and an apartment. And now I can have my own parties.”

Munching on a fry, Rey stared at the woman. She had beautiful, long blonde hair, styled over her shoulders. It looked shiny even in the dim lighting. Her high cheek bones helped set off her smile as she flipped her hair. Her shirt was bright yellow. She leaned against her hand and smiled at Rey again. Rey couldn’t understand how Kylo couldn’t have fallen in love with her in an instant.

“I guess that’s cool,” Rey finally answered, then popped a fry in her mouth.

Liza’s friends started talking to her, leaving Rey to relive her miserable night. Why hadn’t she thought ahead? All she had to do was look up what to do online. She couldn’t even manage that. She wiped at her eyes, realizing how stupid she was. She couldn’t sit still in school and needed therapists all of the time. They were supposed to make her better, but nothing was happening. She pushed away her thought about how Kylo got better but the rotten idea pushed its way into her head anyway. Kylo tried hard to help her get better; things had been good during the first year. They had been normal and nice and just like he had promised. They’d come home one weekend, and then she would go to stay with them the next. Then Bee showed up and they couldn’t come home as often to make sure that he was okay. That was fine. She loved Bee. He needed to be taken care of and loved. He would always chirp at her happily and played with her on the kitchen floor until he was exhausted, flopping down so his head would rest in her hand.

The chair beside her moved and she looked up. Liza’s friends were leaving. She’d made them go away by being sad. Her head dropped further.

“Come sit by me, Rey.” Liza motioned. “You look like something’s wrong.”

Liza wasn’t a stranger, even if Rey hadn’t seen her in years. It wasn’t like all of the panic that Kylo had told her about and then had proved right. Liza was prettier than Casey and nothing was weird about her. She just remembered her as a girl that Kylo hated because she wanted to be his girlfriend. And then he went out and found a boyfriend instead. When she was still an ignorant kid, that thought had comforted her. She’d be the only girl for Kylo and it had made sense then. Now, it was just sending her mind into a spiral.

She left her chair and rounded the table to sit next to Liza at the booth. She slid in and shrugged. “Everything is wrong.”

Reaching out, Liza rubbed her back. “Do you want to go home?”

Instead of answering the question, she shook her head. “Can I talk to you?”

“Of course.” Liza smiled. “My apartment isn’t that far. Do you want to hang out there for a bit until you feel better and then call your parents?”

Biting her lip, Rey nodded.

“Come on.”

Liza took her hand and led her outside, past the other tables and back out into the near-summer air. Liza didn’t even have a coat on, but she just smiled at the sky. She looked so pretty, with long legs and high-heeled boots. She even had a tattoo on her shoulder. Liza didn’t need college to be happy.

Her building was so much nicer than Kylo and Poe’s. The lobby was brightly lit with a long red carpet. She didn’t even know that there were buildings like that downtown. She mostly just went to the movie theatre there and never really walked around. Liza entered a code and brought her inside, looking at her with bright eyes.

She started talking about how nice her apartment was if the lobby impressed her. Her dad wanted her to be safe but also have a place that reminded her of home. Rey wanted to ask why she didn’t keep just living at home, but then thought about it again. Liza could have her own home in the same place as her parents. Why couldn’t Kylo? In the elevator with Liza, Rey hugged her backpack as she touched her back again.

Inside her apartment, Rey let herself relax in how welcoming the space was. It wasn’t just empty, like the house’s that mom showed. That’s what she had expected. Instead, there were pieces of art everywhere: there were half-finished paintings and sculptures all over the broad and open space. Beside the large, living room windows, her eyes were drawn to an easel. Every wall was a different colour, covered in decorations: masks, spears, and cubes.

“It’s pretty nice, right?” Liza smiled. “I decided to be an artist. I work at an art studio. Everyday, I can just live in my imagination.”

“I didn’t know that.” Rey slipped off her shoes and took off her jacket. “Kylo never said that much about you.”

Liza smirked at her. “Yeah, I can guess why. But come on, come sit down and let me know why you were trying to run away.”

Swallowing and looking at the floor, Rey slowly followed her to the kitchen. Liza leaned against the island, watching Rey climb onto a lime green barstool. “How did you know?”

She shrugged and turned, grabbing two diet cokes from her fridge. The door jingled when she shut it. “You came in and looked really upset. And your backpack looks pretty full. Where did you want to go?”

“California. To my real family.”

Liza’s mouth settled into an almost frown. She sipped at her coke and guided Rey to the sofa. Rey hated how desperate she felt as she curled up at her side.

“What happened?”

Exhaling, Rey didn’t know where to start. Her list felt endless. There were the awful girls at school who always called her fat and stupid, and bring up rape every chance that they got. And how her brother was a murderer and a homo. They would stop for a few weeks after Leia came by the school and the girls got detention, or they had to have a dumb group session of talking about their feelings. They would stop for a while, and then they would just start up again. And two months ago, Rey just stopped complaining about it. School was awful not just because of them, but also because of how she could never focus. There would always be some ghost pain or memory waiting to come for her, to make her want to think about something else. The pain didn’t come from Snoke anymore; it came from the hole that was growing inside of her that nothing seemed to be able to fill. She had Rose, Finn and Kaydel. She had her friends at dance. She had so much and the gap just got bigger when she felt guilty about none of those things working.

And then there was Kylo and Poe.

She took a long drink from her coke, letting the sweet taste fill her nearly empty stomach. “Kylo wants to get married.”

“What? Really?” Liza’s face twisted in confusion. “What, to him? To Poe? Wow, they’re still together?”

“Yeah.” Rey sneered. “And then he didn’t tell me. And it was my birthday.”

“Oh my god, that’s fucking awful, Rey.” Liza set her coke on the coffee table. It was made up of old, painted barrels that were cut in half. How did she make that? “Can I hug you? That’s so shitty.”

Rey put her can beside Liza’s and let the woman’s arms come around her into a freeing embrace. Liza wasn’t making excuses for them. Liza was actually listening to her and not telling her to cheer up. Rey wanted to keep talking to her. And her apartment was really cool.

“Thanks.” Rey breathed in Liza’s perfume. It smelled like apricots.

Sitting back, Liza shook her head. “I mean, I never got what was going on there. Paige would always tell me, back then, that it was something to do with not wanted to hurt a girl? What does that even mean? Like, Poe is only a little taller than me. I’m as tall as him when I wear heels, or at least I was at graduation. I mean, I had a boyfriend by then so I didn’t really care but it was just so weird. And they’re still together? Ugh.”

“Yeah.” Rey snorted. “Poe was always nice to me. He always said that he was in the way. I used to feel sorry for him because no one loved him. I could always hug him when Kylo was having a bad day and he’d do fun things with me. But I think he was just pretending to be my friend so he could take him away from me.”

Liza sat up, folding her legs under her. Rey copied her, sitting up too.

“Look, Rey. I only know what I saw from high school and then what I heard from Paige back then. I haven’t talked to her in so long so I’ve kind of lost touch with everyone. Everyone is trying to grow up so fast and I just want to be me, be here, with my art. Maybe move to New York in a couple of years and live with people who know how to make real art.” Liza paused, swallowing a long clunk of pop. “But, like, they never came out to anyone really. If you knew they were together, you couldn’t say anything. Kylo scared the shit out of so many people. Like, what he did to that one guy? And then what he did to Poe’s dad? It was like, shit, he really is crazy. I never really believed that. I just wanted him to like me and he never did.”

Slouching, Rey reached for Liza’s hand. “Weren’t you mad? When he chose someone else over you?”

Liza smiled, her pink lips parting to show her teeth as she laughed lightly. “Nobody, like, does that on purpose. I had a crush on him. I saw him at Christmas in town last year and, wow, that crush never went away. But he ignored me, looking away. Like he used to do all of the time. But I don’t let that hurt me. I just put myself in his shoes and think: oh no, here’s a person who I don’t like, but I don’t want them to feel bad by telling them that. Better to pretend that I didn’t see them. It makes me feel better to think that way. We don’t have to like everyone and not everyone has to like us. I got through so much of high school thinking that way.”

Shifting her weight, Rey pulled her legs up under her cut chin. “That sounds like something Poe would say. I yelled at him the last time I saw him. And he still likes me and I said that I hated him.”

Nodding, Liza shifted to rest her arm around the back of the sofa. “He was always nice to me too. When he first came to school, he’d always try to talk to me. It would be about what I was wearing, because I had really nice clothes, or my nails and stuff like that. I thought he was cute but he was, you know, a freshman and Latino so like, totally a big no for me. So I didn’t think about dating him. But I sort of missed all of his questions about Kylo. He’d asked what music he liked, what movies he liked. He’d ask what his family was like. So I told him that he had a little sister who he thought hung the moon.”

“Really?” Rey asked. “But, I’m not really his sister.”

Liza set her head back. “Ugh, I always forget that. Sorry, Rey. It’s like, I’m not like one of those people who has their weird, little Ben Solo scrapbook about the details. I just cut his picture out of the paper because I thought he was cute. And that’s so creepy. I’m sorry I told you that.”

“No, it’s okay.” Rey liked how Liza talked. She didn’t look upset or stressed at all. Even Poe’s delight in life had been dampened by living with Kylo for so many years, having to do everything that he said. He would have his shining moments still, but she didn’t want to think about them right then. “I haven’t talked to them in two months. It’s been awful. I have to see another shrink and people come and look at our house because I’m skipping school. And it’s not because mom and dad are mean to me. It’s because school just sucks and I miss Kylo when he’s not home and with him instead.”

After rolling her shoulders, Liza stretched out her hands behind her head. “And you miss him more right after you see him, right?”

“Yes!” Rey dropped her head the second the word left her mouth. “I mean, yeah. I just…I don’t like school as much as he did.”

“And you think everyone is comparing you to him?”

Blinking, Rey looked up again. “Is that the problem?”

“Yeah.” Liza smirked. “Kylo came back all weird and quiet and angry, but he was so focused on school that it was crazy. It’s like he could shut everything off and just do all of the stupid assignments. He only got bad grades when he argued with the teachers so he stopped that pretty quick. But I was so jealous of his grades. Then he started dating Poe and I was super jealous of him. So I kind of understand a lot of how you’re feeling.”

Rey felt her eyes getting heavier. “Liza?”

“Yeah?”

“You’re really nice and I wish that Kylo had dated you instead.”

Tilting her head onto her shoulder, half of Liza’s mouth curled into a smile. “I think you would have felt better if he hadn’t dated anyone. And wasn’t marrying anyone.”

“Maybe.” Rey yawned. “Can I please stay here tonight? Please? I don’t want to go home.”

Liza sat up. “It’s almost midnight, Rey. We should at least tell your parents where you are.”

Trying to look as sad as she felt, Rey met Liza’s eyes. “But I’m safe here. If you take me home tomorrow, then it will be fine. They’ll be mad, but I’ll just promise to let them take me to more doctors.”

Rubbing her face and smudging her makeup, Liza shook her head. “It’s still not what we should do. I’m really sorry, Rey. You’re, what, like twelve? I mean, when I tried to run away when I was twelve, my parents freaked out and called the cops and it was a total mess. And I totally understand why you’re trying to run away. If Kylo wants to marry his weird high school boyfriend without telling you first, then I’d want to get away from him too. What’s your parents number?”

Blinking, Rey realized that she didn’t know. All of her numbers were in her phone. And that was at home. “I don’t know.”

Shrugging, Liza pulled out her phone and started scrolling. She hit call on one number and made a face.

“Ugh, Kylo blocked my number. Fucking asshole. Um, let me look up your parents.” Liza stared at her phone and then rolled her eyes. “It’s still unlisted. Are reporters still calling your house? So weird. I can’t find it. Um…”

Liza trailed off, still looking at her phone. She swore again when she realized that she didn’t have Paige’s or Hux’s numbers. She really didn’t know her friends anymore. But she’d kept Kylo’s and he’d blocked her. She tried a number and it just rang.

“Poe is not answering either. At least he hasn’t blocked me.” She glanced up from her phone for a second and then back down. “I don’t want you to take the bus or a cab home. It’s so late and there are weirdos out and I had so much to drink before you showed up at the diner. But I promise that I’ll take you home first thing in the morning and explain what happened and act like you were just coming to meet with me. Your parents will be less mad if they can blame someone else, right?”

Nodding instantly, Rey actually smiled. “Thanks, Liza. I just…I just want to wake up somewhere else and not be me for a while.”

Liza set her phone down and looked at her with firm eyes. “Can you do one thing for me, though?”

“Okay,” Rey narrowed her eyes at the look. “I can try.”

“Don’t try to run away again. You’re a beautiful young woman, even if people just say that you’re a kid. You’re going to just keep getting prettier and stronger as long as you find yourself. And Kylo will still be Kylo, not really knowing who he is.” Liza’s eyes softened at her glare. “Maybe tomorrow, after your parents are done yelling at you, you can call him and tell him how you’re feeling? Because about the only thing I know is that he loves you a lot. I saw it when I was there. Paige told me. And Kylo told me too. I wouldn’t have remembered you if he hadn’t talked about you so much.”

Leaning back against the cushions, Rey started to feel exhaustion claw at her eyes. “But he didn’t talk that much to other people back then, back when we were just in the world.”

Liza didn’t answer her lonely thought and instead reached out and guided her off the couch. She helped her get her pyjamas from her bag and she guided her to the washroom so she could change and brush her teeth. Rey’s eyes were falling shut, but she still slipped on her nightgown and ran her toothbrush over her teeth. When she was sitting on the toilet, Liza’s shower curtain started to distract her. It was splashes of red on a white background. Shapes started to blur and she finally forced herself to leave the washroom after washing her hands.

“Do you want some water or something?” Liza asked. She was leaning against the wall, waiting for her.

“No, I’m okay,” Rey answered and then yawned. She started for the couch and that’s when Liza grabbed her shoulder and turned her towards a bedroom.

It was an actual plain room in the chaotic place.

Liza shrugged after she turned on the lights. “This is where my grandpa sleeps when he stays over. He says that the masks are weird and look like him.”

She waited by the door as Rey climbed into bed. “Thank you, Liza. I’m sorry that Kylo was so mean to you.”

“He was never mean. He was just him. Goodnight. I’ll wake you up early and take you home.”

Rey curled up on the comfortable pillows and hugged them closer to her body. They still didn’t feel like Kylo. They didn’t even feel like Poe. They were just pillows. The light went out and she didn’t care that there wasn’t another source of light and that the blinds were drawn. She was too tired to be afraid of shadows in the dark.

She dreamed about when things were easier, when it was only about survival. If her head were kind, then those dreams wouldn’t turn into nightmares of hurt and terror. She didn’t want to feel the dirt on her feet; she just wanted to see Kylo’s kind eyes and feel how he used to be when he was soft and small. But her dreams turned into now, how he was alone now. Because he’d made so many stupid mistakes. Before, how he thought had been easier to understand. Now, he was building up walls that she couldn’t break down.

It wasn’t the world that pulled them apart, it was Kylo.

A warm hand was rubbing her shoulder and she jerked awake. “Kylo?”

Instead, Agent Jinn was squatting beside the bed, looking at her with blood-shot eyes. He glanced up at a group of policemen behind him. Liza had her hands over her mouth and was pushed away from her line of sight. What time was it? Why was Agent Jinn there? Had she messed up this bad?

“Thank God we found you.” He pulled her into a hug and she heard him sob and she was instantly awake. “Thank God, Rey.”

“I didn’t mean to run away.” She quickly said, feeling tears from exhaustion and pain sting her eyes. “I just didn’t want to be there anymore.”

“It’s…it’s okay, Rey. We found you. You’re alive. That’s all that matters?”

Pulling back, she shook her head. “Alive?”

“Rey. Come on. Get dressed. We’ve been looking for you all night.” His voice dipped into anger and she swallowed hard. When he met her eyes again, she saw ripples of tears that sent her heart thundering. “We thought that you were dead too.”

 

-=-

 

Kylo looked at the blood on his hands, slowly turning from his palms to his knuckles. It was still damp and tacky when he touched his fingers to his thumbs. He counted his fingers again, making sure that they were all still there. But they faded away into the thickness that covered his hands. It wasn’t warm anymore. The cold had taken the last of the life from it over time.

He’d forgotten how it felt.

Seven years had erased the texture, the sensation of having caked blood under his fingernails. They’d wiped the thick smell of dead leaves from his nose, how it lingered and spread up to fill his head. It had been seven years since he saw how crimson stained his skin, but still left patches of his own pale flesh beneath them.

But sitting there, with the police lights flashing around him and dull voices filling his unfocused ears, he was fourteen again.

He was twelve, ten, and seven all at the same time. He was watching children being dissected, putting his hands into motion when he was commanded to. He was cleaning up patches of dried and ruined flesh. He was drenched in the pain and death of being there again.

He wasn’t sitting on the curb outside of his apartment, police circling around him.

His neighbours weren’t lurking around him, asking what had happened.

He wasn’t there: he was gone.

An officer dropped to one knee beside him, touching his arm. He nodded, keeping his eyes down and let himself be taken to wherever they were taking him.

Snoke’s shadow followed him the entire way to the police car.

He didn’t want to wash his hands when it was offered to him. He needed to keep one last piece of Poe with him for a little while longer.

He didn’t say anything as they brought him into the station, into an interview room. He’d lost time, blanking out the drive. He just stared at the people trying to talk to him, still locked into walking into his apartment.

There had been questions and faces, but he didn't register any of them.

But the ringing in his ears finally cleared when someone moved a chair across the table from him.

“We’re so sorry, Mr. Solo,” the detective across from him said, sitting down. “We found the cat. He’s being taken care of. You can pick him up when things are more settled. But we’re going to have to go through some questions about your evening.”

He lifted his head, then let it fall back down again. He slouched down lower in his chair and mumbled an agreement. At least Bee was okay. He’d just left him in the hallway like he was nothing. “I know that you have to.”

“So you had dinner with Agent Jinn and then went to the gym. When did you get home?” The room was too quiet. The question made too many ripples through the silence. He’d already answered this. It was the first thing he’d managed to say when he was outside and mumbled his answers to stop from screaming.

He looked up at the detective again. He’d forgotten his name; he had introduced himself to him when he sat down and offered him a glass of water in the interview room. He didn’t care. He didn’t need to know his name. He didn’t know his own at that point.

He was fourteen, but in a grown-man’s body.

“At 10 p.m. I…you can check my phone records.” He forced the words out, staring again at his hands.

“Exactly 10 p.m.?”

He flaked a streak of blood from his knuckle. “It’s when I said I’d be home. I go to the gym on Fridays. Then I come home, shower, and we watch a movie.”

“How long were you at the gym?”

He blinked at the question. “About an hour and a half.”

“So, you’d say that you got there at 8.30?”

He wanted to look at something other than his hands, but the room was starting to spin so he had to focus on something else. “Quarter after. I texted him then.”

His phone was sitting in the centre of the table and the detective lifted it up, asking him to unlock it. He watched the man open his text messages and scroll through them. He closed his eyes then, seeing the words in his mind.

It had been a normal day. They’d woken up together but Kylo had been up too late the night before, agonizing how Poe was leaving and he needed to deal with that. It was just the summer. He could go home and be with his family and Kylo could force Rey into talking to him, to deal with both of their feelings. Since Rey erupted, they’d talked more. Kylo had stopped causing arguments, making sure that Poe felt okay. They were doing better. Things were good. They were supposed to stay that way. They were supposed to have the weekend together and then he'd fix things with Rey. This wasn't happening. It wasn't real.

He’d smiled at him after listening to Agent Jinn’s talk, even though it wasn’t anything that he was really interested in. Then, after hugging him, he walked away.

The last time he saw him was walking back to the other side of the campus, in the direction of their home.

He should have followed him.

Not replying to the last _I love you_ burnt in the back of his mind.

The pressure started in the back of his head, spreading ache across his brain until it reached his eyes. Angry tears formed and he slumped to the floor. He didn’t know when he started screaming, but it came to his ears when someone touched him and he lashed out, striking out at whoever had tried to get close to him. He curled up on the floor, forcing the hands away as the sobs kept his breath away. He forced himself up against the wall, trying to get air into his lungs. He still smelled like him.

Poe had stolen his hoodie the week before and they didn’t have time to do laundry until today. He had glared at him when he had put it on that morning, feeling how the pocket had been stretched out and finding an empty chip bag there. He told him to stop taking his clothes, how they were too big for him but still managed to stretch them out. Poe had puffed off his chest and punched him in the arm, saying that he was just as big. And then they missed doing whatever they had planned, ending up on the couch and filled with one another.

Gasping, he pulled off the garment. He needed to keep him. He needed to still be there.

The police officers looked down at him with sympathy burning in their eyes. He didn’t want those eyes. He didn’t want these feelings.

“We need to keep going, Mr. Solo. We know that this is hard but…”

He snapped his head up, forcing himself to his feet. He stood up to his full height and wiped at his face. “This isn’t hard. It’s impossible.”

They wanted to leave him to gather his thoughts but he shook off the idea. Get it out. Get it over with.

“So you and Mr. Dameron spent the evening apart? He went out with his friends and…”

“Jeremy Carter, Allison Drake, and Totti Allé. They have the physics lab together. He was out with them and then went home to do the laundry. I needed to make sure his friends were safe. All of their numbers are on my phone, with their addresses and notes about what they do. They haven’t been in trouble with the police.” His response was gruff as he held his hoodie in his bloodied hands. “He…I…where’s his phone? Were we robbed too? I didn’t see…”

The detective sat down again, motioning for him towards the other chair. Still keeping his eyes unfocused, he forced himself to sit down. “We have it. We’re going through the crime scene now. We’ll do an inventory and then you can see if anything is missing. We need to follow your evenings, okay? You know all this. We saw the work that you’ve been doing.”

He didn’t bother to frown. “So you know that I was the kid who was…”

“Held by a serial killer for seven years? Yes, we’re aware of all that. Now, focus. Did anything strange happen that day? Anyone following you?”

He sucked in a forced breath. “He thinks I was being paranoid. When I…after I got out, I’d sometimes see things that weren’t there. I’d imagine people following me and my…the little girl who I saved, she would see them too, so we weren’t crazy. But the last few months, maybe a year, I knew we were being followed. I saw him the other day but I couldn’t catch him. I’ve looked up everyone in our apartment building and all of our friends. I couldn’t let anything happen. There’re only a few criminal records, but only for things like possession and theft. I can give you their apartment numbers if you want.”

“That might be helpful, but we’ll get to that later. We’re talking to your neighbours now.” The detective sat up, giving him an even look. “We’ve already called your FBI agent friend. He’s here. Would it help you answer some of these questions if he could come in? Questions about your partner?”

“Fiancé,” he corrected, weakly. “He’s my fiancé.”

He had asked to call Agent Jinn and not his parents. He didn’t want Rey to know that Poe was dead. He didn’t want anyone to know. If they knew, then he’d really be gone.

The detective took a deep breath. “Can we send in Agent Jinn?”

“Yes.” He sounded pathetic. Poe would have taken his hand then, squeezing it until the world felt right again. He would have put himself aside and let him take over everything. Like he always did.

The detective looked at the door and nodded.

George entered the room and Kylo almost tackled him, needing to feel something as he left the chair the instant the door opened. He was drawn into a hard and long embrace and his tears returned, even as he tried to keep them down. Crying was what got people killed. He couldn’t cry.

He was fourteen again in the hospital courtyard, watching Rey play in the fountain.

“Kylo, Kylo, shh…” George whispered. “Let’s sit down. Let’s do the investigation. Let’s find out who killed him. Follow the steps.”

He clung on tighter. “When I found him, I thought that I did it.”

Only George could hear him. Only Agent Jinn could know what he felt.

The thought had pressed on him the last hours. He didn’t know what time it was. He didn’t really know where he was.

He was walking through the door of their apartment, drawn by the smear of blood on the door and the laundry basket on the ground. He was tired from the gym, stretching out the last of the aches in his legs. His calf was still stiff. When his hand touched the door, time stood still.

He stopped and stared at it.

Neither of them got nosebleeds. Maybe Poe cut himself doing something stupid. He would always cut vegetables like his own fingers didn’t exist. Maybe he cut his hand on the laundry basket. That’s why it was on the ground.

But the hairs on his arms stood up and he couldn’t lie himself into believing that.

He left the door open and stepped inside.

All of the lights were on. Their apartment was small but worked for them because Kylo was always tidy when he had to be and kept the space in order, despite Poe’s hurricane characteristics. They didn’t fill up the house with junk. It was easier to leave if they didn’t have that much stuff.

But the living room was in pieces. He saw notes and books scattered on the floor. The coffee table was pushed aside. The couch where they had made love the day before had its cushions disturbed, strewn in all of the wrong places.

The splash of blood on the wall was smeared and he wasn’t breathing.

He was trying to listen for anything.

Any sign of life.

He followed droplets of blood towards their bedroom. The guest room, Rey’s room, was also lit up. But their room’s door was closed.

“Slower, Kylo, slower.” George pulled away, forcing him to meet his steel-blue eyes. “Keep going. What did you see?”

He’d been talking. He’d been saying everything that was happening.

His cheek twitched, but he nodded. “The door was closed. But I saw the red puddle on the floor outside. It was still warm. I thought that he still might be okay. I…I didn’t want to touch the doorknob. I didn’t want to destroy the evidence. We have these dumb dish-washing gloves, so I went back and got them. And then I saw him.”

Poe was curled up on the floor, at the foot of their bed. His eyes were open, staring up at him.

His hands were still wrapped in the quilt from their bed.

 _Their_ bed, _his_ fiancé.

Nothing bad was supposed to happen to him.

Kylo had screamed until the world blurred out at that point. He didn’t understand how he had gotten outside because he was still on his knees in their bedroom, cradling a warm corpse.

Everything was burnt into his mind and he couldn’t get the words out fast enough. He remembered grabbing him, screaming at him to be okay. He saw the slit throat. He felt that the blood was still hot. His skin was still smooth and warm, but his eyes were lifeless. He knew that look. He had held death too often in his hands not to remember its intimacies.

“I just wanted to hold him. I knew that I was ruining the crime scene. I just…” he broke to sob again. “It’s the guy who’s been following us. It has to be him.”

George slowly guided him to sit again, gripping his hand. “You said that before. I believe you, Kylo. What else did you see in the room?”

“Just him.” He looked down, staring at his hand in the agent’s. “There was no pulse. His heart always…I…But I looked up and saw how messed up the bed was. He fought him. I didn’t see the weapon, but his hands had defensive wounds. He fought until the end but he _saw_ him. There was other blood. Check the bed. It’s like…there was other blood splatter. A smear on the closet. I saw that.”

It was all clear in his head but the words came out wrong. He was still standing in that room, looking down and hoping for Poe to breathe again.

He wasn’t looking at the other detective. He just heard Agent Jinn telling him that he was doing a good job.

“Kylo, it wasn’t an easy death. He fought hard. I’m so, so sorry, son.” George was saying, still holding his hand. They were equal now. His hand wasn’t so small anymore.

He was back in the courtyard again, looking up and realizing that he was the only man in the world he could trust. He would make it better; he would figure out what was wrong with him. Agent Jinn would fix this. He was looking through the pictures again, feeling his grief build about the kids that he couldn’t save. In his mind, Poe’s picture was shown to him in that moment. He’d just missed it before.

Kylo sucked in another breath, breaking the stillness of the fountain. “The defensive wounds…I…my DNA is going to be there. I kissed him. I tried to make it better. Touching always makes it better.”

He wept again, clinging to anything familiar. Poe’s scent was still in the room and Agent Jinn was there. He was fourteen and sixteen at the same time. He was stuck in Snoke’s basement, but Poe was there, holding his hand and telling him to stand up to him, to fight back for him and Rey. Rey took his other hand and he fought Snoke again with his bare hands, killing the terror.

But this wasn’t Snoke.

This was someone else.

But at the same time, it had to be him. He hadn’t killed him. He’d come back to haunt him, to take light from his life.

“I need to talk to Rey,” he managed to say.

“I’ll call your parents again when we’ve gone through a few more questions, okay?

He just stared at George and he sighed, knowing the look.

He turned back to the detective and let Kylo fall into silence.

He heard the story of their relationship retold from another perspective and swam in the warm memories. How his emails started to tell the tale of a friendship that blossomed into something else. The dinner before the anniversary when a very nervous teenager shook his hand and then stared at him all night. How he’d called Agent Jinn from his car at sixteen when he thought the world was going to swallow him up. At his graduation from high school, when Poe had been afraid to talk Kylo’s idol still. During his temporary internship, when he asked if having a boyfriend would hurt his chances. At the ceremony in the spring when Poe had held his hand before he spoke publicly for the first time in years about the pain he’d felt over the years.

“…so I’ve been working with Ben since he was fourteen. The progress he’s shown has been exceptional; he’s fought through many anger and intimacy issues, but he’s still seeing an agency therapist at least every six months at this point, as well as a therapist on campus. This relationship, between him and Poe, is something stable for him, but they have their problems. We have kept in constant contact over the years and I’ve watched him grow up and into himself. He still has only a small circle of friends, but the two most important people to him are Rey and Poe. I can give you a list of potential suspects, everyone who has shown over interest or obsession about this…case.” George paused to look at him. “Are you here again?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m back.”

“Good, that’s good.” George turned back to the detective, who was nodding.

“This is our case, but we’ll take all of the help that we can get. He was a boy that didn’t do anything other than go to school. No drugs, nothing with campus security. Neither of them has been on our radar for anything. We’ve checked with the campus, but it’s the middle of the night so we won’t know much than the bare bones until morning. Since they’re not in the dorms, they only will tell us if they’ve been busted for drinking at a frat house. We’re still canvassing for witnesses. Whoever this is, he came there for a reason and surprised him. Maybe he thought they’d both be there.” The detective’s voice was grim but Kylo was nodding.

“It has to be one of the parents,” he said, his voice neutral. “Someone mad at me for not being dead. If he’s been following us, he’d know that he’d be alone. I’m stupid for having a schedule. For having patterns. I left him alone. He killed him to _hurt_ me.”

Both of the other men were quiet until Agent Jinn sighed. “We’re often lucky if our suspect is so easy to find, Kylo. You know that.”

The detective left them to make a phone call and Kylo finally let go of Agent Jinn’s hand to grip the hoodie to his chest. He wasn’t crying anymore but he knew that he was mumbling to himself.

“Kylo, you need to rest. We’re going to call your parents so think about how to say this to Rey. And we need to talk to Poe’s parents. Do one more thing for him, okay? He needs you right now.”

But Kylo could only look at the smudges of blood on his sweater. “He needs me but he’s gone.”

A warm hand covered his, but it was still the wrong hand. “Do you have the information on your phone?”

He weakly nodded, rattling off the unlocking code. “His mom is in Florida, with her new family. He loves his little brothers. She can’t tell them that he’s not here anymore. I don’t know where his dad is exactly. He fucked off to California when he was sixteen. He sends us letters, asking for money all of the time. I saved one. I think that his address is on it.”

“All right. Thank you, Kylo.”

Without words, just his eyes, Agent Jinn left him alone, taking his phone and lifting it to his ear when he was outside of the room. Kylo stood to watch him go, feeling darkness gripping at his mind.

Then he saw Agent Jinn pause in his step, gripping his phone. His shoulders straightened and then fell. He turned back towards the room, fixing his suit jacket.

Kylo took two steps back and sat down, gripping at his knees, digging his nails into the fabric.

But he didn’t feel anything.

When the door opened, George’s face was calm but Kylo knew that he was fighting some sort of panic. His eyes never darted around like they were doing right then.

“I need to go, Kylo. I need you to take a deep breath and be as centered as you can be at this moment. Find whatever is left. Whatever you used to do in that house, go there right now.” The seriousness in George’s voice made it hard to find that old and buried feeling and dust it off again. But he had no strength at that moment and fell into numbness.

His shoulders slumped and he let the emotions that had been coursing through him be pushed back. Whatever pain was coming, he couldn’t feel it.

“Rey is gone and they found blood on the windowsill.”

His jaw started shaking and he needed to fight against his reaction. _Be numb. Don’t feel anything_.

What was left of his soul shattered as he nodded. “I’m alone.”

“I’m going to go there and find her.” George knelt at his side. “You can’t answer anymore questions right now. Stay here and they will take care of you. I’ll see you when I find her. Think about that.”

He dropped his head and managed to dully shake his head in agreement.

When George finally left him, he overturned the table and the world blacked out.

 

-=-

 

They were driving. It was morning.

The sun was still shining. She thought that the world was supposed to stop moving when someone died in the real world, but it hadn’t. The trees kept rolling by and the cars were passing them; people were probably going to work.

When a kid died in the house, she would always feel it before it happened. The way that people breathed would change. Time would get slower and the flakes in the air would spin longer in the thin beams of sunlight that she could stick her hand into to feel warm when Kylo was away.

But she didn’t feel any of that.

“Is he really gone?”

Her question was met with silence.

Her hands wouldn’t stop moving so she stuck them under her legs. The hole in her made it hard to deal with how she felt.

Rey’s head hurt as she still tried to swallow what Agent Jinn had told her and the quiet that followed. She’d heard the words but they were just fantasy. They just bounced around her head and wouldn’t stick. He was the only one that she had to talk to and he wasn’t saying anything.

Mom and dad couldn’t go to Kylo. They were looking for her.

He was alone.

She’d left him alone when he needed her the most.

Her lip trembled and she furiously blinked back her tears. “Why?”

The agent didn’t look at her. His hair was sticking up and his tie was loosened. He’d been up all night, looking for her, think that she was dead too. She had heard how he shouted at Liza, for being irresponsible and not contacting anyone. He had kept his voice level when he talked to her, but she knew how angry he was. How scared he must have been.

“We don’t know yet.” He shook his head. “Try to get some sleep.”

“But I can’t.” Her head hurt too much to sleep. “How can he be dead? Why is this happening?”

“I don’t know. But we’ll find the answer.” He still wouldn’t look at her. “Rey, there is a lot for me to think about right now. I know that you have so many questions, but I hope you understand how terrified we were. I don’t know enough about what happened to him yet not to give into the panic of thinking that this is something personal. We’ve been monitoring people still drawn to this case. There are hundreds of them. I thought I was doing the right thing, letting you both have normal lives. I should have done more to protect all of you…”

He trailed off and wiped at his eyes. Rey wanted to reach for him, but kept her hands on her lap. Agent Jinn wasn’t weak. Rey knew all about weakness, when she couldn’t keep pushing herself to be what everyone wanted her to be.

“You’re safe right now,” he said. “Let’s just get back to Kylo.”

That was the last thing that she wanted, but she didn’t say anything.

Nothing meant anything.

Things like this weren’t supposed to happen in the real world.

 

-=-

 

He woke up and he was in a hospital. He smelt it before he opened his eyes.

His wrists were heavy.

He blinked twice and then decided to go back to sleep again.

Everyone always died because of him, but death was never kind enough to take him too.

 

-=-

 

The car stopped. She’d managed to fall asleep, but woke up in a haze.

Her heart was beating. Her eyes were open. She was looking at Agent Jinn but the world tilted.

Why were they at a hospital?

“Did Kylo kill him?”

His eyes were furious, blue shifting into black. She saw Snoke in that look. Her hands wouldn’t work. They couldn’t find a way to open the door.

“Rey.” Agent Jinn exhaled and his eyes cleared. They switched to a calm blue sea rather than the rough waters from before. “He thought you were gone too. Can you, for me, find somewhere in your heart to not think of him like that? He tried to kill himself last night. He’s lost, Rey. We have to find him again.”

Her lip trembled and she finally felt her breath catch in her chest. “What if I can’t do it again? What if I’m tired of saving him?”

With sympathy, but also with harshness, he reached for the car door. “Someone you loved has died, Rey. We all need to come together and figure out what happened. You're not alone, but he thinks that he is.”

The door slammed shut and finally broke the final string that Rey had been clinging too.

He wasn’t just Kylo’s boyfriend.

He was always supposed to be there.

There was supposed to be forever in the real world. People weren’t supposed to go away like this.

He was her friend and the last thing she ever said to him was that she hated him.

Tears stung her eyes as the though settled in her chest.

Screaming alone, she let her hands scratch the dashboard of the car. She didn’t want to feel anything anymore.

But as the words came back to her she reached for the door. Agent Jinn was already there and she fell easily into his arms.

“I’m sorry.” She gasped, breathing in the exhaustion that he was radiating. “I didn’t mean to…”

“Shh,” he whispered, holding her closer. “We’re going to be okay.”

She didn’t believe that.

 

-=-

 

Mom hugged her tightly. Dad didn’t know what to do with his hands. Hux was leaning against the doorframe, looking like he’d just woke up. None of it felt real. She could smell how much they’d been crying.

Kylo was still asleep. She didn’t want to look at the angry stitches that snaked up his arms or how the machine was beeping beside the bed.

She didn’t know how to feel.

It all melted away into nothing as she looked at him.

The memories of the softness of his eyelashes brushing against her cheek made her look somewhere else. But the echoes of his lips against the corner of her eyes, how soft and gentle they were. She could only look at his mouth as he murmured something in his sleep.

His arms were taped up.

There was too much white.

Death wasn’t this clean.

“Is he going to be okay?” She found her voice, still holding mom’s hand.

“We…we hope so.” Leia exhaled. “We need to…we need to talk about what happened Rey. When we figure it out. But he needs you right now.”

The words made it easier to step towards him and take his hand.

 

-=-

 

“…and just one more signature and then you can be discharged.”

Kylo could only nod, adding one more Ben Solo to the form. “It was…I mean…”

They made him stay there for a week, but he didn’t trust the calendar. It felt longer, endless. There were things that he had to do but they kept watching him.

He just wanted to go home, but he didn’t know where that was anymore.

The nurse quirked her head. “You don’t need to explain. Your family is waiting. It will be okay, Ben. Just call us if you need anything. We…we’re so glad that we saved you.”

He let the pen drop on the paper and turned.

He finally saw Rey for the first time in the daylight.

He knew that she’d come to see him many times in the hospital, but he never opened his eyes when she was there. It was a bruise that he let grow into a wound.

He fidgeted, trying to pull down the short arms of his t-shirt as the bandages grew in his mind.

“Come on,” Agent Jinn’s arm pressed against his back. “Let’s go somewhere and think about something else for a while.”

He’d been there the entire time. Kylo had drawn him into this hell too.

He could only nod.

He hadn’t said anything

He was done with talking for a while.

 

-=-

 

Kylo wasn’t speaking. He just kept staring at his hands. Tears were falling down his face silently as his eyes were fixed on one spot.

Dad had helped guide him into the hotel room. There was nowhere else to go. Home was three hours away and they’d go there eventually, but right now they needed somewhere neutral that wasn’t the hospital. The last week had been spent going to the hospital or talking to the police. Rey didn’t want to think about what was happening as she held mom’s hand, getting to their room.

“Come on, you need to get cleaned up,” dad said to Kylo, shutting the door. “We have some of your clothes. So you can start feeling a bit better.”

“Don’t want them.” Kylo said, still standing by the door, leaning lightly against the wall. He slowly started to slide down the wall and Han had to lunge to catch him. Still, he let him kneel on the carpeted floor. His shoulders started shaking and Rey was frozen.

Instead of pushing anyone away, Kylo accepted having his parents around him. But her feet were stuck until he finally looked at her.

She quickly ran to hug him, feeling his hot face against her shoulder. “I’m sorry.”

There were no other words. They were stuck right then.

“It’s okay, Rey. It’ll be okay. I’ll get us out of here,” he mumbled against her neck. It was like his voice hadn’t changed. Those words were the same ones that he’d said to her when they got out that day.

Slowly, she stepped back. “I know you will.”

She let dad take him into the bathroom, forcing him to his feet. The only thing that she could do was turn to mom and let her sobs finally emerge from where they had been stuck in her chest.

 

-=-

 

He looked up from the floor, his eyes still slow and heavy. “Dad?”

His father sighed, kneeling next to him. “How are you doing, kiddo?”

Shrugging, he took in the hotel bathroom. It was bright and clean, just like the bandages that still covered his arms. It all still smelled like the hospital. The cleaners had just scrubbed it down again. He noticed the hurried and missed spots.

“What do I do, dad?” He focused on the spot in across from him, beyond his father’s head. It was going to grow into mould if they didn’t clean it. It was going to get bigger and bigger and the wall would rot. He’d seen it happen. He’d been able to create a hiding space in a rotten wall, filled with stolen food and things that could be used for weapons. He should have used them sooner. If he’d done it, he would have been out sooner. Fewer parents would be angry with him. Fewer people would want to come after him and Poe. He’d created this. He made him be gone, like the rest of them.

Han leaned over, gripping his face. “You keep going, son. You do what you’ve always done since you came back to us. You keep telling them to go fuck themselves and prove them wrong.”

He could feel the tears twinning on his cheeks. “How do I do that without him?”

Between his blinks, he saw his father cry for the first time in years. He was drawn into the feeling. Someone else was mourning him. Someone else felt something.

“Ben,” Han said, letting him go to sit across from him on the warm tile. His back covered up the mouldy tile. “This wasn’t your fault. George will make sure of that. He didn’t do anything wrong, neither of you did. When you’ve had some sleep, now that you’re out of the hospital, you’ll find the answer.”

He wiped his nose, the itch from crying growing too much. “That’s not what I asked, dad.”

Han shifted his legs, folding his hands over his knees. “The last five years, he was another son to us too. He’ll always be. I’m sorry I missed the beginning. I mean, I saw the signs before you went and did, well, when you went out and busted a head. But I never thought this would be the end...”

His father paused to look up at him. Kylo felt his eye start to twitch again and his father moved to sit beside him, along the wall of the too-big, too-clean yet not clean washroom. He leaned against Han, closing his eyes. His father had always been there with him when he was there and he was just too blinded by rage to see it. When he was alone in the closet, crying for Rey, Han had been there. He sobbed again, remembering the cruel words that he’d said to everyone.

“I know that things weren’t perfect, but don’t go digging up old hurts and trying to undo an argument. It happened. Agonizing over it won’t bring him back.” Han hugged him again. “What I’m saying is that he’s gone for all of us too. Someone took him from you and you’re going to be pissed off for a long time and I won’t fucking blame you. George doesn’t blame you and we’re here for you. Punch a few holes in the wall at home. Break a few plates. But you’re not alone in this. You’ve never been alone.”

He wanted to pull away. He wanted to feel angry then because the damned mould spot was staring at him again. But he was drawn back down to numbness. “But now I am alone.”

“No, you’re not.”

He slumped against his father and managed a weak nod.

Han lifted him from the floor and motioned for him to take off his shirt. The bandages scratched at his arms. But he wanted Han to see how they’d stitched him up this time. All of his old wounds had to heal in silence. Now he could just peal off the cotton and show how much everything was coming down on him. He stripped down, letting it all go. He complied, just wanting to go to sleep.

He was six again, having his father help him so he could take a bath. His hands wouldn’t move right because he had been too excited from the day. Han put his shirt aside and held his hand. He didn’t look at the angry, hateful stitches that arched up his arms. He patted his shoulder as his hands steadied to take off his pants. Turning on the shower, Han stepped back to meet his eyes.

Kylo realized it was the first time he was looking down at his father rather than up.

“Showering won’t take away his memories, Ben. Let them set in and figure them out instead,” Han said. “Should I leave you alone for a bit? To get cleaned up?”

Shaking his head, Kylo turned away. “Just don’t look at me. But stay here. Please.”

His father shut his eyes and Kylo could finally strip down and get in the shower.

The water hit him like a thousand small cuts.

He wished that they would shred him open so he could wash down the drain too.

 

-=-

 

The police were there all day after Kylo got out of the hospital, talking to him but also her. Agent Jinn wasn’t asking them questions; he just sat there with Kylo. Rey just wanted to go home. Kylo asked about the cat and then asked for his psychology notes so he could start studying again.

The day after, Kylo was gone. He didn’t answer his phone. It would just keep ringing. Dad went to look for him and she stayed with mom. Part of Rey didn’t want him to come back, to stay where he was and let all of his pain consume him.

But then he would be out of her life. She selfishly wanted to keep him.

When he came back to the room in the afternoon, he just blankly told them that he went to the gym and he had to keep going, to keep moving. His eyes weren’t his when sat down on the bed and took a long drink of water.

And the world kept swirling into chaos.

 

-=-

 

Kylo just stared at the boxes that were brought back to the house and then went upstairs to his room. Han and Leia looked at her with heavy eyes and she followed after him.

They’d found some drug dealer connected to Poe’s father and a drug debt. He was dead, overdosed, they said, the day after the murder. Kylo screamed about how wrong the police were. The man who they found dead in an alley wasn’t the person responsible for this, despite finding some of the things missing from their apartment: one of Kylo’s journals, a knife from their kitchen covered in his blood. The cat’s collar. Just not the ring. That was the only thing still missing so it couldn’t be him. He couldn't have just pawned it. They were wrong and needed to talk to Agent Jinn.

Even when they told him that it was the truth, Kylo’s eyes were filled with doubt at the news. He didn’t believe that it was something like that. It was too simple. He wasn’t done fighting the world.

And Rey had to follow him down that road because he was dragging her along with him.

 

-=-

 

Rey had to take care of Poe’s brothers during the funeral. It was embarrassing. Why did they have to have the funeral there? Why couldn’t they just take him to Florida and leave them alone?

They sat in the front row. It wasn’t like grandpa’s funeral because she knew the person in the casket. She didn’t need to be told when to cry or how to feel. She held onto their hands as she sat between them. Kylo had his arm around Mrs. Dameron as the service started.

He hadn’t eaten the last week.

Mom and dad had to force him to talk to his professors about how to proceed with his courses. That was the only decision that he’d made as they packed up their apartment. He was coming back in the fall. Hux had a spare room. He was going to keep going. When he wasn’t silent, he was just angry. She couldn’t calm him down.

But now they were finally home.

And Rey was wearing her least favourite black dress to say goodbye in.

He looked like grandpa in the casket. He didn’t look like himself. He wasn’t even smiling. If there was one thing that Poe did best, it was smile.

Rey held Fredrick and Nicholas’s hands tighter when the prayer ended and Kylo had to go up to speak. He had been angry during the funeral planning, saying that he wasn’t reading anything from the fucking bible because God didn’t exist. There was no God, no devil, no heaven or hell. There was just the _fucking shit_ that everyone did to everyone else. He had told the priest to go fuck himself and then stormed off. Then he came back and apologized, his knuckles tattered and bruised.

This part had always confused Rey. She’d looked up eulogies online and talked about them with Ahsoka and Dr. Windu. Did all of the other kids get them? Did their parents really have to stand there and say all of these things about them? It didn’t make sense. They were gone. How was this supposed to make anyone feel better?

Kylo’s eyes weren’t focused when he stood beside the priest, the same one that should go fuck off. Rey was again really glad that they never went to church. All of this was too weird. But Fredrick was starting to cry so she had to reach down to hug him and missed what Kylo was saying.

“…but we were just stupid kids. Kids who didn’t know any better, but ended up together. But then when we grew up, he became clearer to me. Who he was wasn’t just someone who liked to talk and joke and _always_ take my food. He was made up of feelings. Those were the parts that made us love him. Those are the parts that I will hold on to. I shouldn’t be standing here because I don’t think that I can ever match those feelings. The five years that we had together were about growing up. He grew up being happy and not afraid. When his brothers were born, he knew that they wouldn’t have to be afraid either. When I close my eyes, I can still hear him telling me not to be afraid. That tomorrow will fix everything.” Kylo paused, his voice stilling. “For him, there is no tomorrow. But I think that we can make a tomorrow for him. And I don’t want to let him down.”

Kylo didn’t cry. He just stared off into the distance. He folded the paper in his hands and went and sat down.

The priest started talking and all Rey wanted to do was to reach out to him. But she held Nicky’s and Freddie’s hands, doing her part too.

 

-=-

 

He was rifling through one of the dozens of boxes that clogged their basement. He’d been drinking most of the day and a thought had brought him down to look for one of his journals.

Why did it have to be down there? Why was everything underground?

“Hey, son, what are you looking for?” Han’s voice was instantly grating on his ears.

“One of my journals,” he mumbled, moving aside another stack of books and paper. “The one that they found at that fake crime scene wasn’t the only one that was missing.”

Han folded his arms. “Well, it could have gotten mixed up with his things that his mom took. Maybe call her and ask?”

That was a month ago. He hadn’t been thinking for a month.

He shook his head, sighing. “No, because I packed those boxes and remember exactly what I put in them.”

He slammed his hands down and glared. He’d been forced to pack up their entire lives together into dozens of boxes and send them away to be packed into another basement and ignored and forgotten.

“Ben, I know what you’re feeling and…”

“You don’t know what this feels like,” he hissed. “He meant so much to me and I just put him through hell. He didn’t deserve this. He deserved to be happy and I just…what’s the point of loving anyone? Loving anything? And why couldn’t the fucking doctors just let me die too? Why can’t you all just stop picking me up from the floor and let me fucking go!”

“Ben,” Han’ voice peaked. “You know that I’m there too. We’re all there.”

He ignored him and kept digging.

The notebook and his ring were still not there.

They’d been robbed but the police were still useless, blaming another killer who couldn’t have done it.

 

-=-

 

Hux handed him a beer. It was the first time he’d left the house alone since June, when he started going back to the gym. But it was late July now. The world needed to keep dragging him along. Sitting on Paige and Hux’s couch, he was still floating in a haze. But he was allowed to go out of the house now. He took the medication. He talked to people. At least to them, he was getting better. Inside, he knew that he was rotting, but if he just kept moving then one day he’d be able to figure this all out.

“We’ll take care of you, man.” Hux said. “It’ll be okay. Do you want us to keep the cat?”

He shook his head after taking a long drink. “The cat belongs to Rey now. She’s taking care of him.”

“Still, I mean, if you change your mind.” He shrugged. “How are you doing?”

He didn’t answer the question. “You don’t have to help me move in. My parents will bring my stuff.”

“Sure. That sounds good.”

How long was he going to be broken? That’s the question he wanted the answer to.

 

-=-

 

Late August meant Kylo should be going back to college, but the silence had hung over them all summer. She just had to look at his arms and know how bad things were. But he was surfacing. He was spending time talking now, but always looked at her with haunted eyes. Still, studying helped him think about something, anything else. She’d spent her days with her friends, especially Ahsoka and Dr. Windu, talking about her feelings and how to be okay. The social worker still wanted her to find more stability, to go stay with Luke and change schools. Have a fresh start. Even Agent Jinn didn’t look at her the same. Everyone would make her change the subject away from Kylo, trying to make her focus on who was really gone.

Standing out on the porch, he reached for her hand and she just stared at his outstretched palm until he lowered his arm.

She’d just come out there to ask if he wanted dessert.

They hadn't talked all summer. 

But it was time.

“Are we ever going to be okay again?” she asked. “Can you ever forgive me?”

He turned and frowned at her. “What did you do wrong? You didn’t kill him.”

“No, but I was mean to him. And I can’t say I’m sorry to him, but I can say it to you.” She shifted her weight and tried to lift her head but his eyes were too heavy. She looked at her feet again.

“The only thing I can do is keep going. I’m…I’m done being stuck. Done trying to hurt myself,” Kylo said, shaking his head. “For him, for you, for myself, I need to keep going. If I don’t, then all the time that we spent together would be meaningless. I can’t do that to him. I know that he died because of me; the cops are wrong. And I need to be in a place where I can figure it out.”

Rey bit the inside of her lip. “That’s going to take a long time, though.”

“I know.” Kylo stood and looked down at her. His face had thinned and his eyes still held tears that he hadn’t shed yet. “But it’s all that I have right now. And if you give up on me, then I’ll have nothing. And I’ll be gone again. I don’t think I can ask you again to never stop loving me. But please, please never stop loving me. And I think that you should go live with Luke for a while. This summer has been hell and you’re not getting better…”

Gripping the railing, Rey looked at her hands. When Kylo was eleven, he had already taken care of her for a year. She didn’t remember that year, but he did. He carried so much within him. And all of that made her love him more. But right now, he was fractured and broken.

“I’ll never stop loving you,” she said. “And I love him too. Still.”

His eyes squeezed shut and he shook his head. “We both loved him in a different way.”

She knew these parts. She’d heard them. She’d seen them. “Don’t talk to me like I’m a kid.”

Leaning against the railing, Kylo sighed. “That’s not what I’m doing. I’m trying to make it clear. So we’re both thinking the same again. Like we used to do.”

The world levelled in Rey’s chest. “Are you going to leave me? I don’t want to go live with Luke and hear about how messed up I am all of the time.”

“If we don’t send you away, are you going to run away again?” He snapped and then dropped his head. “I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that.”

He never asked her about that night. Liza came by to apologize and Kylo had been silent, but still accepted her hug and Rey knew that he was thankful that she had taken care of her.

But he never talked about it.

He was only talking now because he was going to move away and they wouldn’t be together any longer.

“Why did you want to leave me?” She asked, her voice weak. “Why are you always trying to get rid of me?”

His head dipped lower. “That’s not what I’m saying. That’s not what all of this was about. The plan was always for you, Rey. I was allowed to have other feelings along the way. But I’d always come back to you. Maybe going away and being far away from me will help you because all I do is ruin lives and get people killed. Keep loving me, but you need to get away from me for a while and get better yourself.”

He left her on the back porch, going inside. He didn’t slam the door. But he still left her.

He wasn’t in his bed when she went upstairs and she didn’t have the strength to go downstairs.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: References of past rape, abuse, m/m sexual content and major character death.
> 
>  
> 
> I'm still not happy with this chapter but it's over 50 pages long and I can't agonize over this forever. The next chapter will flush out more of Kylo's thoughts and healing, along with Rey moving forward as well, and then we'll be back on track. There will be softness coming up so if you make it through this and don't rage quit, I'm going to stop punishing everyone eventually.


	28. Chapter 28

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey and Kylo start their drive towards being apart, but old ghosts still haunt them. Read author's end notes if you're rejoining this story or want more details.

 

They either left the next morning or didn’t.

Just her and Kylo, leaving for some dumb new school in the middle of nowhere in Michigan with Luke. She still didn't know him. He was just a part of a family who she wasn't really related to, other than being thrust into Kylo's arms after she was born. It was never her choice.

Nothing was.

She hadn’t bothered reading any of the colourful pamphlets — filled with happy smiling children — and had left them on her desk. She’d move them around occasionally to make it look like she’d read them. But she hadn't. It felt so empty to decide something that had already been destined for her by everyone who claimed to love her. 

Rey was left with the decision, but it didn’t feel like much of one. Even if she stayed, Kylo would be moving in with Hux and there wasn’t space for her there. Nothing was the same anymore and it made being angry all of the time easier to explain. Even when she spent time with her friends all summer, swimming or riding bikes or just hanging out and talking, she’d always have to come home to a house filled with feelings. Talking with Ahsoka or Dr. Windu was getting better as long as they avoided talking about _him_. She was tired of everyone pretending that they were doing this for her. If they were being selfish, she could throw it back at them with quiet anger and unsettled grief.

Trying to forget it all, she sat with Rose and Finn, playing a board game in her room. Her bags were packed but everything could go back in place in the morning if she changed her mind. 

Kylo has offered to play the game with them after dinner and she had just glared at him and shook her head.

He was trying to talk to her more. He wasn’t as sad anymore; he was just blank. Ahsoka said he was rebooting, restarting. But Kylo had dealt with death before and had let it wash away like the blood from his hands.

Everyone told her to stop being so hard on him. And it made her ache inside to realize what she was doing to someone she loved so much, which made her even more agitated.

“Your turn,” Finn said, nudging her. The dark-haired boy had looked at her with sad eyes the entire night. It wasn’t really what she wanted, but she was going to miss him if she left. He’d always try to suggest something to do that didn’t involve thinking. He’d made her a list of dance videos and they watched each one. He even sat there with her as she tried to perfect the moves. Those had been the good days of the summer.

And now there was just this.

She was enrolled in both schools. She could still say no.

Nodding, she pulled another trivia card and tried to sound as light as she could as she posed the question to Rose. Kylo wouldn’t have understood the game. It was never his thing.

And she’d have to spend the next three days with him in a car if she agreed to leave the next morning. She wanted more time with her friends to finish making her decision.

Rose got her question right and the next turn was hers. Rose looked so happy to get the silly bit of trivia correct; she was smarter than her and Rey didn't care about it really. Spending time at Rose and Paige’s had been less pleasant than hanging out with Finn. Paige was distant to her, other than to watch her carefully as she ate. It got annoying so she drew back from the Tico house. There were too many eyes watching her everywhere and they didn’t need to be from her friends.

Breathing in and out, Rey ran her hand on the game box. Maybe she should have just called her friends and asked them to play it that night.

Mom and dad talked with her about it a lot. But Kylo seemed to just accept that it was something that had happened and ignored it because he never asked her about it. He would quietly snap at her whenever they said more than four words to one another but other than that, he was just blank. She wanted him to be madder at her, to confront her. Instead, he’d just blink away any argument and turn quiet. 

Mom would make excuses for him. Dad would just look sad.

Getting away would mean clearing her head from all of this.

But leaving her friends? 

Now that it wasn’t fully her choice, she wanted to cling to them and overlook their faults, how mad she could be at them. 

“Rey?” Finn’s voice jolted her. “Maybe we should just talk or something instead. Watch some dance clips or something else you like.”

“You’re kind of distracted.” Rose bit her lip. “It’s like you haven’t been really here all summer.”

“Someone died, Rose,” Rey said, narrowing her eyes. “It hasn’t been a normal summer.”

Finn touched her arm. “Yeah, but you don’t really talk about him.”

Rolling her eyes, Rey flopped back onto her floor. She didn’t want to talk about him but still used him as an excuse. Swallowing that guilt was almost routine by now. Breathing. She had to breathe. “A lot of people have died. Why does he get to be so much more important than all of the other kids?”

Both Rose and Finn inhaled at her tone, the bitterness rolling off of her tongue with minimal regret. She had to ignore the spark of feelings within her telling her that she was wrong.

“I don’t know, Rey.” Finn sighed. She could feel his brown eyes on her and forced herself to look away. “We only knew him for a couple of years. But you used to like him…”

“I was only pretending,” she answered. “For Kylo.”

“You’re lying.” Rose’s voice was soft, but it still made her sit up. “You always talked about the future with them and stuff like it was really going to happen and…”

“Things changed Rose. Kylo started picking sides and…”

“Did he really? I mean Paige is busy all of the time at college and I know that she still loves me.” Rose was just making herself sound stupid with the comparison and Rey scoffed. “Okay, don’t get mad at me. I know that he’s not your brother.”

Her body felt rigid. “I want you guys to go now.”

“What? Rey, come on…” Finn started but Rey was already picking herself off of the floor to go get Han and Leia.

Maybe she’d be better off in a place where no one knew whom she used to be.

 

-=-

 

“Ky?”

Sometimes the corpse would talk to him, taunting him in his dreams with ghostly whispers that were only a hollow reflection of the past. He would turn his head, dead brown eyes desperately looking to him for comfort that Kylo couldn’t give anymore. The sound would always linger, shaking into reality until he woke up.

Dreams weren’t supposed to smell.

They never had before.

Kylo was shaken awake by the same desperate feelings that had been clouding his sleep the last few months. They felt like years. He’d tried to drown them out at first with rage and desperate hatred, only buoyed back to life by his mother and father. Rey had lurked beside him, only taking his hand when she felt like it. Then, when he rolled back into depression, it turned alcohol and sleeping pills and digging through his old life. But on the good days, he got more trust. Substances were awful and he didn't need them to turn numb. Independence was more important. As he righted his mind, in the last month, he finally made the full turn towards the numbness of talk and therapy. He found solace in focusing on the two things that shone through the darkness: get a career helping others and getting Rey to be better than he’d ever been. Than she'd ever been. She wasn't four years old anymore.

Gripping his pillow, he stared out into the darkness to avoid seeing the ghosts that still resided within him and wouldn’t let him go.

In the dreams, he’d always be the one holding the knife, seven years old and staring into Poe’s haunting eyes, waiting for Snoke to push him forward to find out how warm he still was inside. It overlapped with the reality of finding him, holding him, screaming at his loss. Now, it all intermingled with the past; the part that Poe had helped chase away had come roaring back in his absence. The feeling of the blade sat heavy in his hand even as he tried to wish it away by clutching the pillowcase. It was soft and smooth, not hard and callous. The death was in the past, despite how it lingered in everything that he did, digging up old wounds that had never fully healed. He had just glossed over them with a bandage that had been harshly ripped away from him.

Be grounded. Touch something, smell something, look at something. He was real and breathing. His hands were there and real. And he hadn’t killed anyone in seven years.

He had to keep telling himself that.

Rubbing his eyes, he rolled over and checked the clock. 3 a.m. He was starting the drive with Rey to Michigan that morning and they needed to at least make it to the hotel that they booked across the border. He needed to sleep but had been pulled into consciousness that he really didn’t need at that moment.

He stared at the empty side of his bed. He smoothed the wrinkled sheets, letting his head tilt until he couldn’t look at the spot anymore. He rolled over to the other vacant space beside him.

Both sides were empty.

He’d lost both of them in one way or another.

And it was his fault, no matter what excuses others tried to make for him.

Annoyed at himself for dropping back into selfish tragedy, he left his bed.

He hadn’t been comforted moving home; he'd just went there because he had nowhere else to go. His room hadn’t changed. Neither had _his_ room.

It wasn’t like the bitter reminder when he came home the first time. Now, he could see through his parents’ grief from a different height.

It was never about him. It was about them hoping that he would come home.

The difference this time pushed him forward. They _knew_ that he was dead, so why keep the memories hanging around?

Rey’s door was closed and he raised his hand to knock, but then pulled away. He’d been trying not to run to her for comfort, instead hoping that soft looks and gestures would make her realize why he had a hard time speaking over the summer.

She wouldn’t talk to him. She just suffered with him there, staring at him until she could leave the table at dinner to sit in her room and talk with her friends. She’d hang around with Paige’s sister and her other friend, Finn. They’d both look at him like he should be dead until he started to believe it and needed to leave the room to sit in his closet until he felt scared enough to be alive again.

He was a grown man. He had a life to get back to. Continuing to wallow and hurting her were making it hard to focus.

The pieces were there. He just had to put them back together again.

And she had to do the same.

She still hadn’t accepted that she was not being sent away because he was being selfish. It was a fair thought, he scoffed to himself while still looking at the ‘Keep Out Kylo’ sign on her door. On the days when he could find a spark, he’d look into the information that Luke had sent him. There was more help for her there with the program and the doctors; she hated structured school even though he had found solace in something normal. It hurt him to realize that he hadn't told her enough about how everything worked in the world; he thought he'd done enough and he'd failed her. An alternative environment might help her find her interests and herself. If George hadn’t calmed down the police, which he’d never be able to thank him enough for, she would have been taken away from them, he was sure. He still didn’t understand it all and his months in a fog hadn’t helped his family make many decisions that had to be made. But the family in California, her mother’s parents, didn’t want anything to do with her or them. Where was she supposed to go? He knew that his parents hadn’t told Rey the full truth and he hadn’t been able to either.

He didn’t want her to feel more alone.

Turning away from the door, he went to his parents’ room instead.

“Mom?” He didn’t bother to whisper.

Leia sat up and his father stirred, reaching for the lamp.

It was pathetically routine.

“Ben? How are you feeling?” Leia squinted, reaching for her glasses. “Come here.”

His legs were carrying him to their bed at the first syllable. He sat down and his mother put her hand on his leg.

“We can still go with you.” Han cleared his throat. “It’s a long drive. We can take turns and make it a family road trip.”

That was the original plan when they first started discussing the new program with Rey. She accused them of being self-centered, just wanting to spend time with her and then send her away in order not to feel guilty about it. It was hard to talk her into accepting that it really was what was best for her. A wrinkle of festering teenage anger crept up his spine about the entire thing: she should get to decide what was best for her and they were making it for her by forcing her hand. It was unfair and he hated it, but was too numb to give her his voice in protest.

Going with her by himself was what finally got her to agree to go. She had stormed downstairs only a few hours ago, demanding that her friends be taken home and she would _do_ the stupid program.

He could explain his thoughts along the way.

Or at least he hoped that he could.

Shaking his head out of his feelings, he took Leia’s hand. “I need to do it. She needs to be able to talk to me and I need some time alone on the drive back. George is in Detroit. I’ll be able to talk to him.”

Leia’s hand was firm in his. He hadn’t rejected her caring that summer; it made his old self stir in his chest at the thought. Her voice had been something to guide him through the darkness when Rey wouldn’t speak to him. “It will be good to see him.”

He thought again about all that George had done for him. He had taken time off work to stay with them first at the hotel and then for a short time when he came home. And then again for the funeral. And then again, for several hours, when Kylo had called him ranting in the middle of the night after the police had informed him that the killer was some drug-dealing junkie who was equally as dead. And again, when he was still trying to hide his meds; that was another awful phone call. After talking with George, seeing him and holding his hand or at least hearing his voice, he gave into what was happening: the way forward was with the FBI and he needed to follow it. He reluctantly got him the case file, forcing him to accept that it wasn’t someone else other than another dead man, who'd pawned their shit for drugs. The ring wasn't missing, it was sold and lost for heroin. Rey running and Poe dying were a brutal coincidence. He replayed trying to feel for a pulse and finding only an open wound, and sought out George's words inside. It was definitively not something that he had done. But the nightmares told him differently. He lived that day in his own untrustworthy mind as if his rage had finally consumed him and he’d acted out: the arguments, his own clouded thoughts about his feelings about sex, the idea that no one else could have Poe but him. Living with those thoughts sent him into silence, keeping him from speaking with Rey or anyone for stretches of time that he’d never get back.

The shame of seeing her summer be stolen from her made the urge to stay quiet grow larger. He had to fight through it for her and him: she had to find herself away from his grief.

The fact that she couldn’t talk about him made it all ache more.

“I didn’t want to take a sleeping pill,” he admitted. “I felt fine when I went to bed. But I need to drive so I didn’t want to risk anything.” He was studying her nails, how she still took the time to get them done. It was one small favour that she did in the rare moments that she had to do small things to make herself feel better. He was still having a hard time being kind to himself. Working out felt good; he could at least do that. His father drove him to the gym, making him get out of bed and do something around June. They’d eat lunch after, making random small talk about baseball. It became predictable and after a month, he could go on his own. After meeting with Hux and hearing that he had a place to go in the fall, it made being distracted easier. It helped make July turn into August as time kept pushing forward.

Leia hummed an agreement. “That’s probably a good idea. You can sleep here if you think it will help.”

It had helped before, he heard her say in his mind.

The idea that he’d fallen so easily into having someone who needed him, who always wanted to be around him, who he would put himself in risk to defend, hadn’t been lost on his therapists or in the group sessions. 

Drifting in his thoughts, he nodded. The lamp blinked out and he shifted to rest alongside his mother. He heard Han grumble and shift at the intrusion and it almost made him smile. It was quiet, but having someone hold him, hearing another breath beside him, finally lulled him to sleep.

But his last thought was about how he was going to fix this feeling. Being cast back down into helplessness was the last thing Poe would have wanted. And the second-last thing that he would have wanted was to have Rey struggling to surface under the weight of his unhinged emotions.

There were no dreams now. It was just drifting black until he thought he was dead.

He woke up to Bee purring on his chest. As he blinked awake, finding his breathing and reality, he was almost about to give into thinking that he was back in the apartment and he could roll over and see him there, smiling at him. Still, he pushed through the fantasy when he smelled the lingering scent of his mother’s perfume.

Eying at the cat, he looked over to see Rey resting beside him, watching him sleep.

He was never angry with his parents about how they didn’t check on her that night. He had always hated when they would come into his room to watch him sleep or move Rey when he couldn’t protect her. He wanted her to feel secure, but also to have her own space and world: have friends, have sleepovers, know that she was going to be okay if he wasn’t there. Why he couldn’t do that for Poe was an aching wound that wouldn’t scab over because he had been proven right. Even though his therapist had pressed on him that it wasn’t his fault, he agonized over it. Kylo trusted Rey; but he never truly trusted Poe.

As the thought bled over him, Rey gave him the hint of a smile, like she was almost back to who she was and could be if he wasn’t a black star at this point. “Mom and dad said I should be here when you woke up. They’re making breakfast and checking the truck.”

Nodding, he started petting the cat but kept his eyes on her. “I just want you to get better. You know that.”

She frowned and bit her lip. “I haven’t tried to run away again. I promise I won’t.”

“I wouldn’t be mad if you tried again. We both have…too much to think about.” He looked up at the cat, scratching behind his ear. He should say something to him, but couldn’t find the right words. He was just a cat, so he turned his focus to Rey. “I just hope that you don’t ever feel like you have to try to leave again.”

Sitting up, Rey inhaled and dropped her head for a second. Her look from before faded. With her gentle fingers, the ones that he had denied would ever grow long and nearly adult but would instead stay in their childhood form to comfort him forever, she reached out, stroking down the jagged scar down his left arm.

It wasn’t like touching his scars when he was fourteen. Someone else had caused those. These were all his.

They had healed nicely, but still stood out to anyone looking for them.

He didn’t even remember doing it when he woke up into the hospital. He wanted to blurt those words out to Rey in that moment, to destroy the tension between them. He needed to tell her what had been pressing on his mind, but he couldn’t. Instead, he just let her touch drive his memories. The world had blurred into a red haze: Rey was dead too. He’d lost everything. He had to see and smell death, feel it on his hands and know that the same thing had happened to her. He was a useless protector because he had been driven into other interests. Life was easier in a solitary house where survival was the only option.

The police had tried to calm him down, gripping at him and dragging him from the questioning room. He had started to forget where he was, who he was. He was fourteen and Snoke had killed Rey and he had escaped without her. He was a worthless leftover who had helped slaughter so many people who he had been cruel to, telling them that his and Rey’s survival were more important than their painful tears over their parents, homes, dogs, and friends.

He had only pretended to breathe into restrained calm, to fool them into trusting him.

They’d led him into a break room, somewhere away from everyone else, giving him water and trying to get him to relax. Then they’d left him, searching for Victims’ Services or anyone who he could talk to. He knew how it worked. He’d spent a summer at a small police station. He knew how long it took to get anyone to do anything that they didn’t want to do.

The pressure of being alone had gripped at him then, dragging him down until he needed to break.

It was a painful itch that numbed his arms and legs, spreading cold throughout his body.

Breathing just meant that Snoke had left some part of him alive only because he needed to do it himself.

There was a breadknife in a drawer. It was like they left it there because he was guilty of not being able to protect everyone who he loved.

He remembered holding it, wanting the numbness to go away. He felt his heart beat again as he sunk the blade into his arm. He was able to breathe again as he pressed it in harder, carving into his wrist towards his shaking hand.

The numbness had eased as he took it to his next arm. He was weak in his hand now, spiking his anger. The feeling was endless and he could have drowned in it. How could he feel anything if he was already dead? Killing himself didn’t matter because he was just a shadow, standing in the doorway between life and death.

If Rey was gone, he knew which way he had to push himself.

It was a bitter guilt that he was reminded of every time he looked at his arms or any piece of the life that he thought he had: he gave into the darkness not because someone he loved was dead. He wanted to be dust because, in his mind, she was gone and his future vanished with her.

It was betrayal.

“Don’t try to leave me again either.” She frowned, lightly, then sat up. She picked up the cat, her cat now, and his claws clung to his t-shirt. Touching his chest, she untangled the last one. She left him alone without another word.

The start of a very long day began in his parents’ bed. But at least he woke up with her.

He wasn’t going to let Rey give up on herself. And he had to find a way to get through to her in order not to give up on himself.

 

-=-

 

They had only been driving for an hour when Rey decided she could punish Kylo in different ways than just being quiet: she was seized by anger into bitter childishness.

Kylo tried to talk to her, asking her how she felt.

She responded by putting on her headphones and turning the music up to max. She’d do that to Finn on the bus when he would say something that annoyed her or when he tried to hold her hand. He’d finally give up and whine that her music was really bad.

Kylo’s face twitched. She could see it out of the corner of her eye and started singing along, but missing every other word. That also worked on Finn, driving him up the wall.

Slowly, Kylo’s hand reached forward to turn on the radio. The volume gradually climbed until a debate about tax reform rattled in the background of her pop song.

Yanking out her headphones, she pouted at him and he shrugged but turned off the droning talk.

Huffing, she moved into the backseat, to keep Bee company in his kennel. She purposely kicked Kylo’s seat. At least they were taking dad’s truck. It was so much bigger and she could move around freely.

He responded by turning on the radio again, this time at a reasonable volume.

Back went on the headphones, this time emphasized by quick kicks to his seat, whatever kept him thinking about what he was doing.

They stopped for something to eat.

Rey just stared at the food. Kylo ate and she kicked the bench beside him under the table each time he tried to take a bite.

Rey waited until they were back on the highway before complaining that she had to pee.

The cycle repeated for two hours, neither of them cracking in the process of silently trying to annoy the other into breaking.

It was the longest time that they’d spent together in a long time. And Rey was starting to enjoy trying to make Kylo yell at her, to feel a real emotion.

Rey finally instigated a staring contest, sitting and looking at Kylo without blinking.

He caught it out of the corner of his eye and quietly turned his head to meet her gaze, his eyes shifting from the road and oncoming traffic.

There were cars coming towards them in the other lane but he wasn’t looking.

His hand could slip.

They could die.

Her breath quickened. Kylo _never_ put her in danger.

Her head snapped away, blinking. “Look at the road.”

He actually smirked, looking back at the road. “We’re fine. It’s okay.”

She heard him whisper something at the end. She squinted at him as he returned his focus to the road. “What?”

“I said I won.”

She groaned, folding her arms. “You cheated. We could have died.”

He made a light sound in the back of his throat, almost like a scoff. Then he seemed to crumble from the inside out. His face transformed and he put his hand over his mouth, strangled sounds leaving his throat that made her face him again. At first she thought he was crying, but it didn’t take her long to recognize that he was laughing. A reluctant giggle left her throat; she couldn’t remember the last time he laughed and it brightened her mood. She started to share in the laughter, looking at him with bright eyes. He smiled at her, letting the laughter turn into chuckling.

Maybe he would turn around right there and they’d go home and everything would be fixed. Maybe he realized that sending her away wouldn’t help and he just needed to be around her more. Maybe…

“He would have loved that,” he said, looking at the road with a distant smile.

Her grin lingered but she fisted her hands in her jeans. Of course it was about _him_.

 

-=-

 

They stopped at a hotel and both of them were exhausted. It was late, but Rey still sent him out of the room so she could call her friends.

But having a lighter moment with her had lifted his mood. He felt less tense after breaking the silence and hoped for more progress now that they stopped moving.

To be fair, he also needed some time alone.

So he wandered around the hotel. No one knew him here. He could slouch or hold his head up high and intimidate people. He was a stranger and could be anyone that he wanted.

He sat at the bar and watched baseball.

No one cared who he was.

He zoned out and just watched the late game until it ended and he had to stare at highlights. Even if there were different winners and losers, every game was always the same. Every season had the same highs and lows. The distraction was in the repetitiveness.

A memory of catching a baseball on the beach in Florida flashed in his eyes, then morphed into his jersey being ripped off his chest.

Not tonight.

He paid and left, hoping that he’d given her enough time alone.

Rey was lying on her side, watching her phone. Quirking his head, he tried to smile at her when she met his eyes, but she shrugged it off and went back to whatever she was looking at. She turned away from him and the motion settled heavy in his chest.

Giving up wasn’t an option, he forced himself to think. They had saved each other once before; it could happen again.

 

-=-

 

The falls were giant and roaring. And Kylo wanted to look at them, to make a short stop and do something other than watch highway roadsigns roll by, so Rey had to follow after him as they stopped across the border. Last night in the hotel, he had at least tried to look at her. But she wanted to think about something else, so she kept watching dancing clips all night. And that made her realize that she hadn’t asked if they had dance at this new school.

She moped after him down the path, going by the other tourists who were gawking at the wisps and curls of water droplets being driven into the air by the water.

She stood beside him and he folded his arms, taking in the coolness that surrounded them.

“I always wanted to come here.” He looked down at her and his mouth quirked into a smile. “Do you like it?”

He was pretending that things were like they were before. His question sounded just like he used to do but he wasn’t the same. She wasn’t the same. Her heart broke a little at the thought that she still wanted to be cruel to him.

“I guess.”

 _What’s wrong?_ He actually used their old language again, driving the hurt deeper.

 _I’m tired. The bed was uncomfortable_.

 _Mine was okay_.

He wanted things to be like they were, but there were too many things in the way. He had pushed her away, never explaining why. He had ignored how she was feeling, going after his goals blindly. And the biggest thing in the way was _him_.

“Can we go now?” She glared at him and turned away.

“No.”

She turned and narrowed her eyes. “What’s the point, Kylo? Why did you take me here.”

“Because I wanted to show you something that I always thought was amazing. And it’s like you don’t care. It’s like you don’t care about anything and if that’s true, if everything is just meaningless, then you really need this help, Rey. You can’t be like me and…”

“It’s not always about you!” she snapped.

“It is for you, Rey!” he countered, raising his voice, the first spike of emotion she’d heard in a month. “All of this misery, everything that you’re feeling? It’s because of me. Why do you think I was trying to put some distance between us before? That was about you learning how to be yourself.”

Her gaze hardened. “Then why didn’t you tell me?”

“You wouldn’t listen every time I tried.”

Pursing her lips, she glared. “Because I didn’t want to be away from you.”

The anger in Kylo’s face twisted into pain and she heard him mumble, “Poe was right.”

It made her stomp her foot. “I just want to go. I don’t want to talk about him right before you leave me alone again.”

Rage flared in his eyes. He could still feel things; it amazed her for a moment. She was pushing him again and it was a bittersweet release for her.

Then the look faded and he shook his head.

“You still can’t talk about this.”

“Neither can you.”

He blinked at her, standing up to full height.

His face not revealing his thoughts, Kylo stepped away from her and took two strides forward. The mist still swirling around then, she felt her heartbeat quicken as he put his hands on the railing; his eyes never left hers as he swung his leg over the metal bar.

“Kylo, stop!” she lifted her voice to say, to shout over the roaring water around them.

He kept staring at her, taking his other leg over. He was standing right on the edge, a narrow one. His face broke when he let go of the railing to balance on the threshold.

“Then talk to me!” he shouted. He stood up straighter, his feet so close to falling. How could he do this to her? What was he doing? Panic raged in her heart as her mouth quivered.

People were looking at them now and she ran to the edge, reaching for his hands.

“Please, Kylo, please don’t jump.”

He rolled his eyes. “This isn’t about _me_ right now. It’s about you learning how to talk about these things and to talk to me again from a real place. Not as kids. Not how it was when I was with him. But who we are _now_.”

Standing up straighter, she heard the gravel shift under his feet. He kept his eyes on her and he couldn’t see how close to the edge he was. Rey was afraid to reach out her hands, to keep him from falling. She might push him accidentally. In the distance, she heard someone shout at them and it knocked her out of the silent moment of fear: Kylo was putting himself in danger to force her into talking.

“Okay! I’ll tell you. Please come back to me.” Warm tears spilled down her face as she spoke.

Relief spread over her body as he easily climbed back to the other side. Even though the yelling was coming closer, she wrapped her arms around him and he led her away.

In the truck, in dad’s truck, she sobbed openly as fear still rattled in her chest. He couldn’t die. He could never die. He couldn’t leave her too. Kylo had put her into the passenger seat and then climbed in to pull her onto his lap to let her weep against his chest.

“I miss him too,” she cried. “I miss them all. I miss everyone and I don’t know what to do anymore. I can’t think in school. Someone will say something and I’ll just get _so mad_ and then no one will understand. And I couldn’t talk to you and Ahsoka was mad at me and I felt so alone. Like everyone was trying to control me. I wanted to leave. I just wanted to run away and go to my grandparents because maybe they’d understand it. If you were too busy being in love and getting married then I needed a new family. And then it all went away and now I just want him to be back and you to be happy again. And I want to take back everything that I said to him but I can’t and I don’t understand why.”

His arms tightened around her. “I’m sorry you had to keep this in for so long. I’m sorry for not telling you before, about everything. You should never have felt that way and I shouldn’t have been selfish.”

Sniffling, she shook her head. “You couldn’t stay home forever.”

He kissed her hair as he cradled her. “I need you to be better, Rey. That part is selfish. I can’t keep being pulled in so many directions, worrying about you because I can’t be there. We have Han and Leia, Luke and grandma. We have our friends. We’re not alone anymore.”

“I just want to be okay and be _me_ again,” she whispered, leaning in closer to grip at his sweater. “Will this place make me better? Maybe no one can if you can’t.”

Sucking in a long breath, he hugged her. She could feel his breath by her ear. He still smelled like him. That part was the same. “We’re not there anymore, Rey. We haven’t been there for seven years. Let’s take something from the world. I’m so tired of having things taken from me because of it.”

“I do miss him,” she said, then swallowed more tears. “I miss how he hugged me. I miss how he gave me a nickname. I miss how he made you be more real. I think I got jealous because it wasn’t me.”

She finally felt a hot splash on her neck as he blinked. “You both helped me. Everyone was always helping me and I wasn’t helping anyone. I was just…me. And I’m selfish, cruel, and manipulative.”

Sitting back, she wiped at her eyes. “Who told you that?”

“In therapy,” he answered, weakly. “I started to read between the lines. I made him do things. But he did the same. So I don’t know.”

Swallowing, she shook her head. “I don’t think he ever did anything that he didn’t want to do. When I talked to him, before I got sad, I just knew how much he loved you. And I loved you too. But that was when everything made sense. And then I don’t know what happened.”

His eyes shone as he looked up at her. They had a schedule to keep. They couldn’t sit there forever. But she wanted to. She could feel how his strength was coming back to him. How his emotions weren’t just dialled back to zero. She touched his arm, running her hand down his bicep. She didn’t want to touch his scars, but he seemed to think that way and turned his head away.

“I didn’t want to leave because he was gone. It was because I thought you were.” He glanced back at her, slowly letting out his secrets. “I could mourn him. I couldn’t deal with losing you.”

What he’d said slowly settled in her heart, shattering her lingering anger over what he’d done. “You just wanted to be with me?”

“Yes.”

His face shifted from lingering pain to pure misery in an instant. “So maybe you were right. Maybe I never loved him enough.”

He squeezed out his tears and his hands reached up her back to pull her into another hug.

“I never meant that,” she admitted. “I just wanted to hurt you into coming back to me.”

He still nuzzled her hair, filling her raw emotions with a burst of new feelings. He had no one now but her. If she didn’t untangle her mind, where would he be? They’d done this to one another but she hadn’t been in the world long enough to understand where they both would be in the next few years. She wanted to give up on his promises, but they were still too tempting. If they were both alone, then they were alone together. Like they always were.

“I still didn’t love him enough.” He finally let the words out of his mouth in a tearful whisper. “You need to remember that. If…when…when you get into a relationship, if things feel desperate all of the time…talk about it more.”

“Like we’re doing right now?”

He sat up and gave her a tearful smile. “Like we’re doing right now.”

She held his eyes and watched as he breathed. He’d been stuck for months, not able to talk to her because she had been blocking him at every turn. This was an opening. Watching the rise and fall of his chest, she put her hand on his heart like she used to do. “I love you.”

“I love you the most.” His reply was different, but still made her smile.

As they finally settled, with her in the backseat so Bee could eat and drink and be out of his kennel for cuddles, he met her eyes in the rear-view mirror.

The drive suddenly didn’t feel so long. And being alone didn’t feel so frightening.

But she could still change her mind the next day.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess there are no warnings for this chapter except for the standard ones in the tags and the fact that Poe is still mentioned here. I had to split this chapter into two because it was dragging and I haven't updated in a while because this was damned hard to write. So it isn't perfect and I'm not satisfied, etc. Thank you for continuing to read this because it's a hot mess. There are like five deleted "scenes" from this chapter that I just had to cut so if it feels weird it's all on me fam.


	29. Chapter 29

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rey and Kylo reach Luke's and are met with an unexpected obstacle.
> 
> Read chapter notes for warnings (and a bonus.)

 

Rey was setting down her suitcase in Luke’s guest room, trying to clear her head. She was still full from dinner, the last one on the road. They had run late but it was only after seven when they got there. She'd smiled more, enjoying having Kylo look at her and talking like they were both two real people. It made her feel like eating for once, remembering how much she liked spaghetti. But the room looked okay; there was a large closet and the bed was bigger than the one that she had at home. A thick quilt sat at the foot of the bed. Grandma had made it. Thick red and blue threads intersected into patterns that she couldn't imagine making herself.

She was thinking about the last day of the drive, finally being able to talk to Kylo again.

She saw the deep pain in his eyes when she told him that she ran away because she felt alone, that nothing could fill the hole that was growing within her. He deserved to feel that way, even though it hurt her to accept that those emotions could ever exist in her heart. But he understood. He'd stripped off his own cloud of grief for once and just plainly gave in to her.

He pulled to the side of the highway and she could hear the other cars rushing by them. It was a quiet tempo that she wanted again inside of the silent house; she wanted it to dwarf the other two men shuffling in the next room, deciding what to do with her.

Still, after talking with Kylo and feeling his heart, the ache that she had felt when she was alone with him had started to recede. He had reached for her hand and it felt warm and gentle, like he was almost back. Sitting in that truck, beside the highway, still filled her senses. 

That’s when he confessed, in a low and shaky voice, that he’d thought about running away before as well. He’d thought about killing himself long before, a long time ago. But he’d always think about her at the last minute, or finally realize that he’d been thinking about her the entire time and just let her voice be drowned out by his own selfish pain. And that he knew how she felt and that, even through his fog, he comprehended how torn up she must have felt by his flailing actions in the spring. He’d taken her for granted. Just hearing those words made it easier to focus on why she needed to be away from him for a short while.

Maybe he had to learn how to miss her too.

Bee purred against her leg and she knelt down to grin at him. She was able to take him. Of all the fake choices that everyone pretended to let her make, taking him had been one that felt real.

She ran her fingers along his soft, orange fur and sighed. He must miss him too. He was lonely too. But at least they had each other.

They needed a litter box. The hotel solutions hadn’t been good for him and the car had just made him nervous.

She hopped up, moving towards the half-closed door, ready to open it and ask Luke about where they should put it when she heard Kylo shout. It made her stop and put her arms around her waist. Kylo was angry. It made her tense and hold her breath.

Shakily, she crept forward along the carpeting, letting her feet drag as she moved.

“…what do you mean a year? It was supposed to be until Christmas. No one told me that.”

It was still Kylo’s voice, raised but fading into an angry, lower, tone. She peered through the small gap in the door. In the distant kitchen, down the hall from her room, she saw Kylo stand to glare at Luke. She couldn’t see him. He had seemed happy to see her, excited to take her to see the school the next day. Now, Kylo was angry with him.

She needed to know why.

“We didn’t tell you because you need a break too. And you’re so stubborn that you’d push it too quickly. We know you, Ben, and we know what you’re going through…” Luke’s voice was also low and she had the strain to hear him. She nudged at the door, kneeling down to avoid being seen.

Kylo scoffed, making her smirk. He hated not being in control just as much as she did. “Yes. Everyone has said that like they were also kidnapped, raped and tortured and forced to kill children for seven years. To be treated for PTSD and still insist to go to high school because no one dared to tell you that maybe, just _maybe_ , getting what you want isn’t the most important thing. And now, right now, to know what it's like to find someone that they loved killed with his throat cut because you went to the gym because that’s what you _always_ did on _fucking_ Fridays and then have to think that the most important person in your life was killed the same way. No one _knows_ what I'm going through, Luke, even if most of it is all my fault. The feelings, everything, Rey and I are finally reconnecting right now. We’ve finally, I don’t know, started to get beyond my fucking mistakes. I didn’t agree to this and I don’t think she will either. We need each other right now.”

Rey was still digesting the words when Luke spoke again.

“No, Kylo, you just want her to keep needing you.”

She watched Kylo turn to shove Luke, heard their feet scuffle against the kitchen linoleum. She was about to open the door, to tell them to stop, when Luke pushed him back. Kylo flashed back into her view and he had his shoulders set for a fight. She forgot how he looked when he wasn’t dully dumbed by heartache.

“You know I’m right,” Luke hissed. She could finally see him now, how he stared Kylo down. “Have you really gone a day in your life, this _new_ life as Kylo or whoever you think you are, without having someone needing you or wanting to help you? You had Rey. You both had that blinking language that no one else understood. And then you had that poor boy, who also just wanted someone to love him. Your mother and father are exhausted from doing everything for all three of you. And I can’t even think about what you’ve done to that FBI agent. You know this, Ben. You’re not stupid.”

Rey shifted away from watching them to sit beside the door, pulling her knees up under her chin. No one ever talked to Kylo like this. No one ever yelled at him except her. And Poe. She bit her lip and tried to stop her heart from beating so loudly so she could still keep listening.

Kylo was silent, but she could hear the distant sound of him shifting his weight as the floor creaked. He was thinking.

“I’m not stupid. And I’ve had more than enough therapy to know what I am. And I just keep burying it because I don’t want to deal with it.” Kylo must have had his teeth clenched. The words came out in short exhales. “And I just hurt everyone by doing that.”

“Then, maybe, this year will give you time to think about what you do to other people. Especially her. The ringer that you’ve put her through…I should have helped Leia and Han more,” Luke said, then sighed.

“Why didn’t you?”

Rey lifted her head and turned back to look through the door.

“I had my own shit to deal with.” Luke’s words settled thickly in her ears. She felt a rising pride in Kylo as she watched him glare down at his uncle.

“You know that, one day, my mother will tell me what you’ve been chasing. It hasn’t happened yet, but I will find out. And you won’t be so fucking mysterious anymore.” She could feel Kylo’s anger raise the hairs on her skin. “So why are you here now, reaching out to my Rey?”

“Because she needs someone who at least knows how to pretend to be an adult,” Luke shot back. “And, yeah, Leia will tell you everything because you always get what you want. It’s like how the Earth will one day get burnt up by the sun. Stop using people, Ben.”

“That’s not my name,” Kylo’s voice dipped as he spoke. “He’s died too many times. He died before Rey came and then died again. Let me be _this_ if that’s all you care about.”

“No,” came Luke’s quick reply. “What I care about is her. You can leave right now for all I care. And I don’t want to see you or speak to you for a _year_. And you are not allowed to call her or text her or have _any_ contact with her. You can’t ruin her like you ruined yourself.”

Kylo stumbled two slow steps back and Rey had to grip her hand to her mouth to stop from sobbing. A year without talking? A year without knowing how he was doing? He could push her away, but he always came back to her. No. No, this wasn’t fair. This was hurting too much. They’d just started over and now it was ripped apart again.

Kylo’s lips quivered and he dropped his head. His eyes met hers through the door and tears finally spilled down her cheeks.

 _We need to do it._ The blinks were distant, but she could still read him.

She turned her head away to avoid replying messily. The stinging in her eyes made it hard to focus.

But he was right.

“Let…let me tell her. So I can say goodbye.” Kylo’s distant reply made her finally scramble away from the door. She settled heavily on the bed, her hands shaking so much that she couldn't make them sit still until she tucked them under her thighs, her still too-fat thighs.

Kylo’s footsteps were approaching, but she still heard Luke’s distant voice say, “It’s only a year, for Christ’s sake.”

A year was everything. A year meant twelve periods. A year meant not knowing who he was and what he was doing. It was a year without telling him if she was getting better or not. She'd watched Kylo and Poe fall in love in less than a year. It could happen again. And it gripped at her throat, knowing that he'd be lonely, looking for comfort that she couldn't give. It was a panic that made her sit up straighter, taking a long breath as he grew closer. She wanted him to stop and turn away. To argue more. To tell Luke that he was wrong and that they were going home because this was bullshit.

Still, Kylo’s hand nudged open the door and she met his eyes and sobbed. The look had shattered her. He couldn't leave her now. He should fight against it. Yet, he shut the door with his large palm and looked at her, raw and open like the boy who had saved her so long ago rather than the man that was still struggling to understand.

“Do I really have to stay here?” The words were desperate from her lips. “For a year without talking to you?”

He breathed in and wiped at his eyes. “This isn’t what we thought it was.”

She felt the last of her strength wash away and sobbed. “I’m sorry I didn’t reply to you for months. I always felt nervous to text you back. I’m sorry for being mad. I'm sorry for saying that I hated you and him. Please, please, Kylo fix this. Save us. Save us, like you promised.”

The distance between them already felt endless. And it was about to get so much larger.

He looked down, then up to meet her eyes. “I caused this. I let this happen. Just wanting to be normal got in the way of thinking about you. I pushed you away and now I’m getting what I deserve. And you're hurt again. You should have never been hurt by me, Rey, but I keep doing it. I need to break another promise to you right now, Rey, but it’s the last one I’ll ever break.”

Tears rippled in his brown eyes and she shot out her hand, needing him closer to her. She’d seen him broken, hurting, and everything else in between before. But, now, reality was washing onto shores that she couldn’t fight against anymore. His anger from before, making her talk, was blown away because there were always powers greater than them making decisions that they were too blind to see. Too blinded by one another.

He stepped forward and took her hand, sitting down heavily on her new bed. At least it smelt like grandma and, in some way, it would still hold him too.

It had all come on too hard and too fast.

They had taunted and tortured one another, playing with the idea that they would never be separated. But Rey knew in her heart that Kylo wanted her to get better. She wasn’t broken; she just needed to figure out what wasn’t working. And he needed to be sad in his own world. The bubble hadn’t burst. It just needed to sit still for a time.

But that time would take too long.

She cried again, not wanting to let him go so easily. “Can you make a new promise?”

“Anything,” his husky voice answered.

“In a year, when I get out of here, that you’ll come and get me and we won’t ever be apart again?” She tried not to sound like she was forcing him to do anything. She just wanted to hear the truth. She was so broken down by his lies; she hoped that he heard what she meant.

He pulled her closer, pressing his lips against her hair. His forehead brushed hers, like it always used to do when they were _there_. He knew. “I promise, Rey.”

In his arms, she tried to find her strength. “You need to get better. Not just for me. But for everyone.”

He sat there, silent for a moment. His shoulders tensed and he pulled her tighter for a moment. “I know. And I…I won’t let you down.”

They sat for what should have been forever, but it only turned into a few minutes and then he had to go.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I spent a half an hour crying to Unchained Melody and realized that I should share my writing playlist to this (ughhh don't dox me): https://open.spotify.com/playlist/70YTRr8NmeZBEgQ2S4dR40
> 
> Please excuse the random Swedish songs. And how it's tragically unorganized. And for basically every word I've ever written of this.
> 
> And also how short this chapter is, but the next two chapters will be longer, following the year deadline that we have been presented with here. I'm going to a wedding this weekend so I'll be working on the fucking HAPPIER chapters while there.


	30. Chapter 30

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kylo deals with a year away from Rey. And how he felt about Poe. 
> 
> Read end notes for warnings.

 

A year. A fucking year.

Kylo sat outside of the hotel in Detroit and just stared at the dashboard, repeating the same thought that had pounded in his head the last few hours. It was midnight by the time he got there, but he hadn’t realized how long he’d been driving. The numbers were staring at him. The nearly-empty gas gauge was what reminded him that he had just driven with only rage to guide him.

For Rey, he had to do this. If this was some twisted, cruel part of the program, it must be for the best. He never trusted his doctors, but had to put whatever faith he had left in hers. He still wanted it to be a lie or misunderstanding but it was hard to see through truth and lies anymore.

He had to manage it, for her.

But the urge to destroy himself wouldn’t go away. It roared in the back of his years every time he touched on moving forward.

It had been clear at the falls. Now it had just been fogged away, crushed against the rocks like everything that he'd ever had or will have.

The empty reality rattled in his chest as his jaw started to hurt from clenching his teeth too hard.

He remembered bits and pieces of driving and just thinking about swerving into the next lane and obliterating everything. But a small voice in the back of his head started to scream at him that he couldn’t hurt other people, dragging them down with him.

Sorrow finally won out and he snatched up his phone. He still hadn’t changed the background. Poe and Rey were still smiling back at him and his hands were shaking as he pulled up his contacts.

Rey’s number didn’t even ring. It was the distinct chirping of being blocked. Luke had taken her phone and done this. He clenched his hand and wanted to crush the device.

He dialled another familiar number and shut his eyes.

“ _Hi, this is Poe Dameron’s voicemail and I’m only doing this because Kylo made me. Just text me because I’m never going to listen to this_.” Then, in the background, he heard his own voice distantly say, “ _Why did you do that I…_ ” followed by the dull beep.

He hit dial again.

And again.

He did it until he sobbed after the end of the message. “I miss you. Tell me what to do. Please come back. I can fix this. Please.”

He hit end and wiped at his eyes, finally ready to make another call.

He was pathetically making desperate phone calls to exhausted girls and ghosts. It was finally time to get answers.

His father answered after one ring. They’d been waiting up for him. They knew this would happen. How dare they? “Ben? Everything okay?”

“Why didn’t you tell me it would be for a _year_ and that I couldn’t talk to her?” he spoke through clenched teeth.

“What? Slow down. What did Luke tell you?” His father legitimately sounded confused, but it could be a bluff, like saying they were going for ice cream and then leaving him alone for long enough to lose his life. “Hold on, let me get your mother up.”

He could hear himself breathing, but not much more.

“Ben, where are you? Is George with you?” Leia’s voice joined Han’s. She seemed panicked, afraid for him. She should be. “Tell us what Luke’s done.” 

Wasn't it what they've done? This wasn't their fault? He rubbed his tired eyes and tried to steady himself.

“I don’t know what Luke has done. You talked with the people at that place. Did they say anything about this?” His voice was neutral, tumbling into numbness. “Did Dr. Windu say anything about this? We weren’t prepared and I’m…” He trailed off, looking at the few people on the street. It was an average night for them and it was entirely unfair that they could just stay out late and enjoy life. “I don’t know what to do.”

“Oh, honey. We should have come with you. We’ll fly you home. I’m going to call Luke right now and get this sorted out. Please, please, Ben, don’t hurt yourself. Get some rest and we’ll take care of it. Okay?” He heard his mother get out of bed, shifting the phone as she moved. “Ben?”

He rolled his eyes, determined not to embrace the anger that was still tempting him. “I’m in Detroit, mom. I just have to leave the car and someone will take care of it for me.”

“Well, at least you still have your sense of humour,” Han said in the background, but there was no wit in his voice. “Give George a call. We’re going to figure this mess out. Okay, son?”

“Fine.” He hit end on the call and tried to find the energy to go inside. He wanted to break his phone, destroy it, but then he'd lose the numbers that he'd never bothered to commit to heart. He was as bad as everyone else. And his body ached from driving so far and for so long, but he couldn’t move.

He’d booked a room at the same hotel as George. He probably shouldn’t have done that, but it had felt normal at the time. He'd texted him the details of his stay and Kylo had taken it as an invitation. But now, after Luke’s all-too-correct accusations, it seemed creepy and unnecessary. Poe would have said that if he’d been there. And he would have probably suggested maybe somewhere down the block, but still would have quietly accepted where they’d be staying even if he had been uncomfortable and strained by it all.

Had he really been that cruel to him?

Inside, he managed to check in. He managed to park the truck in the underground garage. He managed to get into the elevator. But he did it all living in a fantasy scenario of having Poe there with him. How he’d have taken a handful of the candy from the desk, pocketing it and forgetting about it until he did the laundry and it would turn out to be a giant clump. How he’d have picked the parking spot, because some numbers were luckier than others. How he’d have hit all of the other buttons on the way out, dooming whoever really needed the elevator to have to stop on every floor. All of it would have been endlessly annoying. But he wanted to feel that itching sensation again, of having to glare as Poe would grin at him until he couldn’t take it anymore and would reach down to kiss him.

Instead of going to his room, he knocked on George’s door.

Anyone normal would have called ahead of time. But he was just _using_ others so that was his excuse.

George answered, still in his suit and holding a folder. “You got here a little late. Come in.”

He shook his head, hoping he didn’t look as dejected as he felt. “It’s been a really long day.”

Both beds were still made, but one was covered in folders and files. The laptop on the desk showed photos of a bloody scene. Beside the computer were two wineglasses. One was empty, unused. The other was half full.

This was George’s life and one that he still wanted for himself, but the finishing line kept getting pushed back.

“Hm,” the agent sighed, turning to fill both glasses. “Have a drink with me and look through some of these. What prescriptions are you on right now? I'm just looking out for you.”

“As long as I don’t take a sleeping pill, it’s fine.” He wasn’t lying for once. He didn’t want a drink but didn’t want to turn it down either. “Thank you.”

He accepted the glass and George frowned at him. “I can see that it didn’t go well with your uncle.”

Sipping at his glass, he turned to open one of the folders. “What are you working on?”

“I’m consulting on a case. Three pre-teen girls who didn’t know one another, all from different races and backgrounds, were found dismembered in an abandoned house. We at least have DNA, but the processing is taking time. So I’m retracing the steps, finding witnesses.” George sat down on the other bed and Kylo nodded. “I was talking to their parents all day, so I can say that it’s been a long day for me as well.”

“What did they say?” He kept looking through the folder, wondering if the statements were in there in rough form. Instead he got the school photos of one of the girls. A smiling brunette with amber eyes stared back at him until he looked up at George. “Were they kidnapped first? They could have known who did it.”

“That’s what we’re trying to find out.” George sat back and loosened his tie. “I can really only stay for two more weeks. I don’t like having a ticking clock, but this is the way it is sometimes.”

Kylo looked around the room for a place to sit and chose the floor beside the bed. “You can do it. If you have DNA, it’s better than nothing.”

“Exactly.” George nodded. “Now tell me why you’re avoiding talking about what happened with Rey. She hasn't called me lately and hasn't been answering my emails.”

He took a long clunk of wine. The taste reminded him of Poe’s sloppy kisses on the couch, his mouth still having the lingering taste of alcohol that night after Hux’s. It felt like a different life, not something that had just happened that spring. Not being able to find the ring meant that it might not have ever happened.

“I’m hoping that it’s just a lie,” he started, stopping to take another drink. “Luke said that I’m not allowed to have contact with Rey for a year. Either he’s a fucking liar, or that fucking place has insane rules that they hid from me or I missed them because I’m an idiot.”

George’s greying brows furrowed. “I don’t recall that ever being a part of their process. I can make some calls in the morning for you.”

Luke was right. He was just waiting around for people to do things for him, to make them do things and solve his problems. If Poe had been there, he would have fought harder against what Luke had said. Maybe that’s why he felt so powerless in that situation. His backbone was gone.

“No, my parents said that they’ll find out what’s going on. You’ve done enough for me these last few months. You have other things to worry about.” His voice was flat. His glass was empty and George stood to offer him more. He accepted, hoping that it would help him sleep later. “But what if it’s a good idea? That’s the part that I keep thinking about. We stopped at Niagara and I just lost it. I hopped over a fucking guardrail and forced her to admit that she missed him too, to talk to me, to tell me why she ran away. But all I could think about was why doesn’t she miss him too. Why was that so important to me? Who cares if she misses him too? It’s her life and I just keep dragging her through mine. Maybe she’d be better off for a year not having to hear my fucking whining.”

“It’s…it’s worth considering.” George shifted off the bed to sit across from him on the floor. It was exactly what Poe would have done. “You were trying to put distance between the two of you before, both with your reluctance to go home and getting engaged. You wanted her to have independence and instead she took it as rejection, running away the first chance that she got. We are getting her the help that she was screaming for now. But Kylo, it’s crucial that she also deals with her grief. That’s why it’s important. Both parts.”

“I still think that someone else did it.” Kylo dared to meet his eyes. “I know I saw the evidence but…”

Exhaling, George reached out to put his hand on his knee. “I’m sorry that I don’t agree, but I do understand why you’re thinking this way. How are you feeling?”

“Shitty,” he shrugged as the hand withdrew. “I wasted all of Rey’s summer by not being able to talk to her. My parents had to move all of my shit and I just wasn’t there. I can’t go an hour without thinking about him. I miss him so fucking much and just see him dead in my mind all of the time. Just how he looked. How I held him. How I couldn't fix it, one last time. His eyes...he was so afraid.”

“I wish I had known him better.”

Kylo managed to smirk. “You intimidate him. He’s always worried whenever you’re around that he’ll say something wrong or weird. He always gets quiet and just stares at you. I have to tell him that it’s fine all of the time.”

The wine was gone and he felt exhaustion finally start to settle over him.

George picked up his glass, standing and stretching. “I think we can talk more about this tomorrow after you’ve had some sleep. I’ll take you to your room.”

He groaned, flopping his head back. Another mistake. “I left my bag in the car.”

Kylo was again reminded of how much he asked from others as George led him to his room down the hall and made a call to send someone to get his things. He sat and waited with him as a hotel employee took his keys and then quickly returned with his black bag. It was only when Kylo had stared into space for five minutes that George said goodnight and that they’d speak again tomorrow.

He was in a hotel room again. They all looked the same. He let the memory roll over him again of that first kiss. Everything would have been different if he hadn’t kissed him back, but then he would have never gotten to run his hands through his hair, feel his arms around him, have a life with him, despite how short it had been. He knew now what it was like to trust someone enough to see all of his scars. Poe had only been a few weeks from fourteen when this all started, during that awkward span of time between their birthdays. The first time they had sex, he’d only been sixteen. And the last time, he was only twenty.

“So fucking unfair,” he said to no one.

Forcing himself to get up and get ready for bed, he tried to find more of the happier memories rather than tormenting himself with the bad. He brushed his teeth and thought about being on the beach that summer in Florida. How Poe had teased him the entire time he was putting sunscreen on him. _You’re not going to tan, you’re going to burn_. How they built a sandcastle like children and then stomped on it. They had napped in the sun after swimming for an hour, finding a free spot to lie together and pretend that they were alone.

Looking at himself in the mirror, he knew he wasn’t that person anymore.

The heartache of losing someone made it hard to think about ever moving on to someone new or even thinking about being with anyone ever again. At least he’d always have Rey, or at least he hoped that he still had her. Whoever his heart was drawn to next would have to be a galaxy of impossibilities: unearthly patient, beyond determined, and unfathomably confident.

 _Attractive would also be nice_. He heard the thought in Poe’s voice and smirked, finally leaving the washroom for bed.

It was dark and he was alone in a new city.

Wanting to fall asleep to a good memory, he numbly started to stroke himself and thought about the last time that they’d made love. It had been slow and easy, both of them bracing for the distance that was supposed to only be between them for the summer. He thought about Poe’s mouth, how he would gently bite his lip, asking for more in the motion. His hands would still ask for contact, making sure that Kylo wasn’t afraid or wanted to stop. The memory of the curve of his erection as it brushed against his when they both were naked finally made his dick twitch in response. He’d always close his eyes when Poe prepared himself, but he’d slowly pump himself at the idea of what was coming. When Poe would reach for him, offering him lube, he’d look down at him again. He always wanted him; even when they fought or argued, he wanted to share this with him.

He was hard now, the first time since then. He could still conjure up how freeing it was to allow himself to be turned on by someone. The gasp that Poe always made as he entered him, holding his legs apart so they could face one another, ghosted through his mind. And then when he was inside him, filling him and loving him, he’d moan loudly and tell him how _great_ it felt. It was a sensation that he’d never know again, but he still had his memories.

His hand matched the ghost motions in his head, remembering how he moved his hips, driving himself faster until he’d reach a perfect rhythm to get them both off. He’d always come first, but Poe would never be far behind.

Reliving Poe’s orgasm made him come. Hearing his breath catch and seeing the shape of his mouth change as he brought him to release. The sensation surprised him; his own breath caught in his throat as he stained the hotel sheets with a strangled cry.

Guilt washed over him, preventing him from leaving the bed to clean himself off. He justified sleeping with damp sheets as fitting punishment for masturbating to such a precious memory.

 

-=-

 

His phone was vibrating and he blinked awake, angry that he’d forgotten to turn the ringer on last night. He’d been too busy jerking off to think practically.

Not recognizing the number, he still answered with an annoyed tone. “Yeah?”

“Hi.” It was Rey and he sat up. “You don't have to hang up. Please don't be mad at me, Kylo. I’m using my new friend’s phone. Just don’t tell Luke.”

Rubbing his eyes, he looked at the clock. It was almost noon. “How is it? Are you okay? Have you talked to mom and dad?”

The questions came out rapidly. The words  _I miss you already_ were supposed to come out but his mouth went dry when he tried to say them.

“They said that they’ve been trying to call you and are really worried. I think that you should call them right away.” She lowered her voice. “I thought you hurt yourself too. I had to call you to make sure. I don't want to be here if you're gone.”

“No, not this time.” He sighed. Everyone would think this way about him for the rest of his life. “I was just asleep. I'm sorry I made you worry. I wouldn't do that to you, Rey. I was driving all night and I just...”

“Are you okay?” Rey asked, cutting through him. He should be asking about her and she was taking the time to ask about him. “Mom and dad were really mad at Luke. My new therapist is really mad at him too. Nobody is making us not talk. I yelled at Luke a lot because I hate it when people lie to me. I miss you, Kylo. But everyone here is so nice...”

“Except for Luke.” He closed his eyes, biting his lip. “So, you don’t want to leave?”

He wanted her to say yes. He wanted her to say no. He was torn in two again. 

She took a deep breath. “I think…I think I need to try this, Kylo. It's different here - all of the kids are like us. Really, like us. I used to think that every kid had a real mom and dad and...and they don't. Other kids have been hurt like us and I don't know what to think. I want more time to think, but Dr. Casterfo wants me to try but not for you, just for myself.”

“He’s right,” Kylo said, then sighed, knives cutting into his heart. “I don’t want to go a year without talking to you or seeing you, but maybe Luke is a little right too. I hate myself for saying that. Remember how I used to say that I never wanted you to hate anything? Just love? You're allowed to hate because I hate so much about me. But as long as you don't hate me, I'll be okay. Remember…remember when we first got out? How fast that first year went? This…it won’t feel as long.”

He heard Rey sigh again. “I hope…I hope you’re right.”

She put her hand over the phone, she was talking to someone else.

“I’ll write to you,” he quickly added. “Luke can’t stop that. Steal the mail key and get it copied.”

Her voice was back in an instant. “And I’ll write to you too. All of the time.” There was a small smile in her voice; he could hear it. But it quickly faded with her next words. “I have to go. We’re going horseback riding. But I miss you so much already and love you.”

“I love you too, Rey. I love you and we’ll see each other soon, okay?” His eyes started to tear and he tried to blink them away. “I promise I’ll be better, Rey. I promise that this is the last time I mess up like this.”

“I…I hope so. I don’t want to say goodbye, but I have to. Please come back to me, and I’ll come back to you. Goodbye, Kylo.”

“Bye.”

He saved the number. He knew himself well enough to know that he’d be calling that number at some point.

There were fifteen missed calls from his parents.

They could wait until he had showered.

 

-=-

 

“But what about your second wife?”

George openly grinned, reaching for his wine glass. “There you are. I was waiting for you.”

“What?” came his dumb reply. Dinner was long over and they were chatting over wine on the agent’s hotel balcony. Kylo had spent the entire day in bed, watching sports highlights and eating room service, until he went to the gym for an hour before showering and then meeting with George. He’d spoken with Han and Leia several times, insisting that he was accepting the situation, as bitter and cruel as it felt. Rey needed to heal. He’d still get updates about her and could pour his thoughts out into words that he’d have time to think about rather than his gut-punching recklessness with talk and actions.

But George was nearby and he felt less numb since he left Rey in the care of his wayward uncle with the threat of no contact transformed into a decision that they chose to make rather than an order from above by that cruel asshole. This was something that they both wanted in order to heal. He had to keep that in the back of his mind; pin it like one of the notes on the wall that he used to have at home.

It was a welcome distraction to sit with George both last night and this evening. They’d gone over the work that George had done that day over dinner, then slowly drifted into old memories again as night fell around them.

“You lived with me for six weeks. I was waiting for questions.” George had had a good day. They had narrowed down where the girls had been taken: a corner store with a camera. They had video of a suspect. Things were moving forward.

Kylo reached for his own wine glass. Agent Jinn was looking out for him, taking care of him. Fuck what Uncle Luke said. He didn’t know him. “The office door wasn’t locked. I went in there when I couldn't sleep. It started to make sense.”

“Okay,” George said and sat back. “Explain it to me, agent, why do you think I favoured my second wife over my first or third?”

Swallowing, Kylo latched onto the challenge. It meant talking about anything else other than what they had dredged through that evening as discussing breaks in the case transformed into his miserable thoughts again. He was confidently buzzed enough to give an assessment. He’d already heard his own life thrown in his own face last night and today; he’d already wept about everything possible. He could turn this around into being a human and not a walking shell. He could dare to give George his own perspective.

“She’s the only one you didn’t have a child with, but you still,” Kylo paused, suddenly worried to keep going but pushed forward, “you still have her picture on your desk. The others are just of your kids.”

He looked up, awaiting approval. He got a grin and could take a drink again.

George looked almost distant; for once it was another person slipping away into a memory. “She was almost a child when I married her, hardly twenty-one and I was forty. I shouldn’t have done that. It only lasted a year. But that was a good year.”

“I had five years,” he softly said. “And now they all have to be good in retrospect.”

Smirking, the agent took another sip of wine. “My first partner, when I was a field agent, died suddenly. It wasn’t work related and wasn’t expected. I was partnered with him for three years and we worked well together but always antagonized one another to see who was better than the other. There were arguments, there were periods of silence. And then I had to pretend that it was all smooth and painless for the sake of his memory.”

Kylo slowly swirled his wine. “He threatened to break up with me once when I was eighteen. I never told anyone how much that hurt and how afraid I was. So, I made promises that I didn’t keep. And he still stayed with me, even as I kept pushing him into things that he didn’t want. We just needed each other and now I need to find out who I am without him. And I will, I have to. Snoke can’t win after all of this time. It’s something I have to do for myself. And also for him. And Rey. Most of all now _for_ Rey. But I’m afraid of the same thing for her. If she doesn’t figure out who she is and what she wants, and where I fit in, then she’ll end up in the same situation and will have to keep starting over again and again.”

“And that’s exhausting.”

“Exactly.” Kylo smirked in response then chewed on the inside of his mouth. “Why am I worth anything to you anymore, George? After all of this?”

The grey-haired man frowned, then sat up. Sometimes, Kylo forgot that it had been over seven years since the first time that they’d met. He took a long sip of wine, making him wait. “You’re worth it because there’s a strength within you that I still believe in. You lived through a terrible ordeal that I think will give you great insight, once you’re old enough to be away from it and understand it from a new perspective. This tragedy, losing someone who gave you stability in one way or another, can’t be ignored. I’ve always been honest with you. Even though I understand why you wanted to hurt yourself, I was disappointed. But I do understand, Kylo. I went down that road too, thinking that she was gone as well. That shows I’m also not perfect.”

“Will…will that prevent them from accepting my application?” His mouth was suddenly dry, watching another dream about to be snatched away from him. The psychological exam terrified him. He was the exact opposite of being mentally stable.

George just leaned back and sipped at his wine. “Someone could lose that paperwork.”

He exhaled, shakily. “I don’t know what to say.”

“I have another thing for you to think about.” George met his eyes and Kylo felt nervous already from the tone. “Take this semester off. Come stay with me for a while. There were still be time.”

“You don’t think I can handle it?” He wasn’t offended. He was more than prepared to accept that he’d be a mess for longer than he wanted to be.

“Oh, I think you can. But whether or not it’s healthy is something to consider.”

“I’ll think about.”

He wanted to ask why he would do that for him, dive deep into this connection, but instead he just finished his wine and excused himself for the night.

 

-=-

 

He didn’t accept George’s offer, but started to wish that he had the second he left Michigan. He had spent the drive back thinking about all the reasons why taking a break was a good idea. After one day at home, spending time trying to converse with his parents, he had packed the last of his things and left for his new home.

And the place he drove to was their old apartment instead. He had parked and was about to go upstairs when the realization shook him.

He was in a terrible mood by the time he got to Hux’s.

Turning a new key in a new door, he was berating himself for not being able to let go of all of this.

Hux was making breakfast when he came into the kitchen. He jumped when he said hello. He was just wearing pyjama pants, his hair sticking up at all angles.

“Jesus, I thought you weren’t coming until tomorrow.” He turned away from the pancakes and still seemed to be shaking himself awake. “Everything okay?”

“No. But it’s the way it is.” He folded his arms, shaking his head. “I couldn’t stand my parents for another day. I just wanted to get this over with. I’m going to get some sleep.”

Hux was nodding, almost too quickly. “Yeah, probably a good idea. We can go to the bookstore later and get ready for next week.”

Kylo stared at him. “Is Paige here?”

He was scanning the table, noticing that it was set for two. But Hux was shaking his head. “Guess I kind of thought that you might show up. If you’re hungry.”

“No, it’s fine. Maybe I’ll have something later.” Not wanting to confront his friend, Kylo retreated to his new room, but noticed the door to Hux’s was shut.

Closing the door to his room, he sighed. Leia had actually listened to him and set up the room exactly like he wanted. He’d taken Rey’s old bed from their guestroom. He didn’t need anything bigger. His desk, his television, all of his books and journals, it was all there.

And sitting on that desk was a picture of the three of them from the day when Rey exploded at them, the day after he proposed. He didn’t even remember the picture being taken. Poe’s hand sat on his and he was smiling brightly, despite how hungover they both had been that morning.

He let the picture stay there and went to bed.

 

-=-

 

“Hey, man, how’s it going?”

Kylo had been staring at his hands, in the locker room at the university gym. It was his first week back. Everything shouldn’t make him want to tear up the progress that he’d made in his head, but it still did. Getting back to the gym would fix some of that, to stop him from just wanting to be in bed all of the time.

“Hey Arthur,” he looked up to say. “Spot for me today?”

He came there already changed but needed to take a few breaths before going out on the floor. Arthur had just walked into the room, greeting him like it was any other day.

“Yeah, sure, just do the same for me,” he said, pulling off his shirt. “Hey, um, I’m sorry about your boyfriend. I read about it and I didn’t see you but…at least they found the guy, right?”

Kylo pulled on the cuff of his shirt. “They did. His dad was into some shit and it just caught up with us. Some guy got hired to settle a debt and then stole some of our stuff and OD’d. That’s all it was.”

He turned his eyes away, but he could feel Arthur still looking at him as he changed. He knew that the other man had his work-out clothes on by now, but still couldn’t look at him. He didn’t believe what he’d just said but it was easier to tell people the lie rather than the truth he was creating in his head.

“Kylo, I…” he started and then paused to take a breath, “look, are you okay?”

Glancing up into the other man’s blue eyes, Kylo shrugged. “It’s been a long summer. I had to switch apartments, and the funeral and everything…”

The last thing he wanted was Arthur to sit down beside him on the bench and it still happened. “Sounds shitty.”

He managed a light chuckle. “Tell me about it.”

They sat in silence for a moment before Arthur slapped his back. “Come on. Enough of this shit.”

For once, Kylo had some respect for people who were so cut off from their emotions.

 

-=-

 

Kylo snuck into Hux’s room, carefully navigating around the mounds of books and paper and discarded clothes. He looked long and hard at the picture of Paige beside the glowing clock radio on the bedside table and believed that her eyes were telling him to feel better.

He couldn’t sleep.

Again.

So he curled up next to Hux, careful to be close to him but not touch him.

He breathed in and out and was almost asleep. The warmth beside him calmed him. The breathing kept him thinking that there was someone else with him: Rey was safe but away, Poe was dead but still haunted him.

He felt himself nearing peace. In his tired state, he reached over and put his hand on Hux’s hip.

Hux groaned, rolling over and glaring at him. “I thought that we talked about this. Wake me up and we’ll talk. You can’t just come and sleep in my bed with me like everything’s okay when it’s not.”

Shrugging, Kylo sat up. He tried to keep his annoyance from his face because he was almost asleep for the first time in weeks. He scrambled for an excuse. “I was too tired to talk.”

Their eyes met in the muted darkness. Hux had dealt with so much the last month. He would have been kicked out by anyone else. Still, his friend kept his promise as Kylo tried to get his life back to where he wanted it to be. Since Luke had cut him off from Rey, Kylo had been drawn more towards any sort of comfort. Her letters to him showed her progress, and his to her showed how stuck he was, looking for a solution to his weakness. And if it was his roommate, that’s what it had to be.

“Come on.” Hux shifted, pulling him into an embrace. “It’s going to just take time, Kylo. Rey’s doing better. And so are you.”

Shaking his head, Kylo sighed against the other man’s chest. “Can I just sleep here for a bit?”

“What time is it?” The tiredness in his voice managed to register through Kylo’s stupidity.

He swallowed. “Just after three.”

Hux pulled back and held his eyes for a moment and relented, flopping down on the bed. “We have class at eight. So if you want to talk, I can be awake for fifteen minutes. Then I really need to sleep and so do you.”

“Don’t want to talk.” He shook his head and turned over, staring at the wall in the darkened room.

Hux’s sigh sounded like it came from the deepest part of his lungs. “Of course you do.”

The other side of the bed shifted and Hux stood. Kylo heard him putting on his robe, the hanger clanging against the back of his bedroom door.

“Come on, Kylo. If I’m not allowed to sleep, then we can at least talk.”

Kylo waited only five minutes rather than his usual fifteen to follow after his roommate.

At least this balcony was on the tenth floor and their door had a code. He had panicked in the second week after moving in to Hux’s old apartment. They were too close to the ground. He called Han and couldn’t breathe at the thought that it would happen _again_. So they moved, breaking the lease, and lived further from campus in a high rise that Hux hated but Kylo felt safe in. And it cost too much but he paid for it all. That was all he could think about as they stood and looked out towards the river. Hux glanced up at him and handed him a cigarette as he lit up his own. This was a bad habit that he didn’t want to get used to. Neither was crawling into Hux’s bed whenever he couldn’t sleep.

Taking a long drag from the cigarette, he shifted his weight against the cold. They hadn’t even had a frost yet but the air was still colder than was comfortable.

“I don’t want to sound like your mother but, fuck, Kylo. It’s October.” He leaned back in the plastic balcony chair that creaked against his weight. He looked at him, long and hard. “And it looks like we’re both skipping tomorrow.”

Kylo shrugged, rubbing his arms. He was just in his boxers, staring out at the street. “I’m not. I have that presentation tomorrow and I’m nervous. That’s the only reason why I did what I did.”

Hux didn’t believe him. He just leaned back. “It’s a good presentation. You don’t need to be worried.”

Earlier that evening, they’d gone over their work together. They found one class together that matched both of their majors: introduction to childhood psychology. Kylo took it to have his best friend with him, but also to understand what Rey was going through.

He had stopped trying to think what had happened to him. He just let the memories come in waves that knocked him down and then picked himself up again.

“Look, Ky, we’ve talked about…”

“Don’t call me that,” he snapped, smoke snaking up his mouth. He exhaled, harshly, into the night air. He took in the rest of his cigarette in one harsh inhale.

Hux met his eyes for a moment and then looked away. “Sorry.”

“No, I…” he shook his head, inhaling again and then snubbing out the burning end of his cigarette. He reached out and Hux handed him another one. He leaned over and the redhead lit both of them a new light. He sat down in the other chair, letting his leg bounce next to Hux’s knee. “I’ve stopped dreaming about him. What does that mean?”

Resting on his elbows, Hux took another long drag. “Maybe it means you’ll finally take down that fucking murder wall from your room. No one else did it, Kylo. He was my friend too and you haven’t given me a second to grieve. I’m never allowed to talk about my feelings, about what I’m thinking. Things are happening in my life too. You only talk about school or Rey and then you stay up all night and need to crawl into my bed and…”

Kylo leaned over and kissed him. It was a quick meeting of lips, but he had no feelings behind it. He leaned back, his cheeks burning as Hux glared at him.

“If you weren’t my friend, and I didn’t love you, and didn’t know that you’re all fucked up right now, I’d punch you in the face for that.” Hux’s eyes softened and Kylo saw tears glimmering as he turned away. “I’m not going to tell Paige. Because if I did, she’d actually punch you in the face.”

He wanted it. He wanted someone one to hit him, beat him, throw him on the ground and kick him until his ribs broke. He wanted someone to break him open and carve out all of the hurt. It had been sitting inside rotting for months. He avoided going out, knowing that he just wanted to cause a fight and watch the whole thing burn down. But if he did, he’d lose everything. Getting a police record would destroy the future; he just wanted to watch the moments implode in which he risked it all in previous instances of self-destruction.

He could still cling to the future. He saw a future, for him and Rey. George had promised him. They’d be safe. Move to Virginia or Washington. It was only three and a half years away. No more being apart once he made it through this year. No more being in separate places where anyone could hurt them; they could be together and he could keep her safe and she’d be whole again. She’d help him; she had to.

“I didn’t feel anything.” Kylo said, leaning back to smoke again. “If that means….anything.”

Hux sighed and snubbed out his cigarette. “It didn’t the last time that you tried that either. And it won’t ever. He wasn’t…I mean…you guys had what you had and it wasn’t healthy most of the time. You’ve said it yourself. He was afraid to leave you alone and then you twisted it and couldn’t leave him alone but I…but I also saw how happy you both were when things were good. And I miss that part of you and him. So please let me talk about this with you and…” He turned away as he trailed off, frowning. “I’m really tired right now. It’s almost 4 a.m. We need to talk about this later, when I’m not exhausted. I can’t let you agonize over something that you’ve already figured out just because you like to torture yourself verbally to avoid cutting yourself.”

Snatching up the cigarettes again, Kylo lit himself one without offering it to his friend. “I just miss him, miss loving him. And now I don’t know what that means anymore.”

“It means that you need more time and to stop punishing yourself.” Hux shook his head, standing. “Wake me up at seven so we get there on time and can actually find a parking spot. And make coffee because I’m going to be tired.”

Nodding, Kylo let Hux go inside and sat out and froze for a few more minutes before going in again.

Crawling into his own bed, he let the nicotine cloud his head as he swam in memories. It was the first death he had nothing to do with.

George had convinced him of that, threatening his own career in the action.

It had been planned because he wouldn’t be there.

That’s all it was.

Forcing himself to stand, he looked at his wall. It had grown since he’d moved in to this new place. Every bit of evidence that he got from campus police. And the local police. And George. It was layered over his notes from his own case, finding where the children were taken from. There was a pattern there of how they were taken that he could link to Poe’s murder. He was going to figure it out.

Everyone who looked at it told him to stop.

And he had to.

 _You need to get better. Not just for me. But for everyone._ Rey’s words burnt inside of him.

Still, he wanted to cling onto the past for a little while longer. He had used him and his love, forcing his way through arguments until he got what he wanted and then he hadn’t been able to protect him. Then, he turned Rey into an angry and heartbroken girl who felt alone.

Suffering was what he deserved for a little while longer.

 

-=-

 

He heard Liza shift out of his bed and groan and reach for her clothes.

Regret shuddered heavily on his still-closed and still-drunk eyes. He’d managed to toss the condom, hiding it at the bottom of the trash. He stared at it for too long, nauseatingly digesting what had just happened. He ran the faucet, not wanting her to hear him vomit. She didn’t. But he couldn’t look at himself in the mirror before he’d stumbled back to the warm body in his bed and passed out until she woke him up just now. He smelt like her. He wouldn’t be able to undo this and make her scent go away.

“Hux is home, I just heard him,” she said, grating on him further. “Do you want me to creep out on the balcony or something?”

She’d just come over for coffee, late on a November day when she was in town for an art show or something that weekend. They’d kept in touch, since Rey had dragged her back into his life. It was mostly Kylo who texted her. He trusted Liza only because of what she’d done for Rey. And she was also too stupid to figure out what he wanted. He’d forced her to stay for drinks and dinner. And then the loneliness took over and now he was waking up like this. He’d felt how wrong it was, but it was dulled by alcohol as he fucked her. He’d been so afraid for so long and he wanted to kill the worry and pain. It was a strange, foreign feeling being inside someone else, especially someone he could hurt. His hands wanted to wrap around her thin throat, to hear her choke. But he didn’t. He just remembered coming, cleaning up, and passing out. This was a temporary solution to his aching heart.

The sun wasn’t even up yet. He reached out his hand to try to get her to come back to bed and drown out his mind.

“No, he was at the bar. Let him pass out and then…then you can go,” he managed to say when her flimsy hand brushed his. Of course she’d be useless. She wasn’t him.

Touching her again burnt like the desperate mistake that it was.

Liza, still smelling like fruit and freedom, pulled away to shake her hair. She shimmied into her pants and underwear in one motion and stood beside his bed. “We’re not dating. I don’t need that right now. And neither do you.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Why would I date you?”

“Because we just fucked and I don’t know, Kylo, it seems like you want to marry everyone that gives you an orgasm? And that’s not me.” Liza looked at him just as she did in high school, bitchy but now with better eyebrows.

“Did I ever ask that?” He was still dealing with sleeping with someone else and she had to throw this at him. Why did he even reach out to her? She was always such an empty idiot.

Slowly, Liza took a breath and took his hand properly. Maybe she did have a thought in her head. “Okay, I came here today, tonight, whatever, as your friend. And maybe I was just the tiniest bit selfish because, God, I’ve wanted you since junior high. And I…” she seemed to be reeling in her almost-empty head. Still, she pinned him down with a furrowed look. “Was this your first time with a girl?”

 _Shut the fuck up, Liza_. _Get out, Liza_. He wanted to shout those things, but he didn’t.

His eyes gave away too much, because she smoothed his hair.

“Hey, Kylo? You were really good, just so you know.”

He rolled his eyes, then frowned. The old fear, the one that had put him into the spiralling desperation that he had with Poe rose in his mind to haunt him again. Maybe his hands had slipped, like they had wanted to. He could have done so much to her; he had wanted to and it made him want to throw up again. “I didn’t hurt you?”

Liza snickered. She took it lightly. Of all of his mistakes, this one would burn hard for a long time. “No, no way. I mean, your hands…you were so kind. I don’t know what to say other than kind, but it doesn’t cover everything that you are. And I like it when guys take charge. Foreplay, fine, you didn’t know what you were doing, but I wanted you so that was totally okay. Maybe work on that next time. Oh, we can be fuck buddies and I can totally show you.”

The words made him shudder and he swallowed, hard. “No, that’s…fine.”

It was quiet in the living room. He’d heard Hux’s door shut a few minutes ago.

“Look, Kylo, we can still be friends and talk. I can tell you why teenage girls act crazy. I take back what I just said because the look on your face just told me that this was a big mistake and it’s my fault. But it doesn’t mean you have to cut me off. We can talk. Just with clothes on, maybe?” Liza was fully dressed now, folding her arms across her chest as she looked at him from beside the bed. “Especially about how you’ve got a wall with maps and pictures and his face looking at your every night.”

“Yeah, sure,” he said, finding words that he could say, then turned away. “Good night.”

She huffed and left.

 

-=-

 

“Who was here last night?” Hux asked as they drank coffee and watched television the next morning, both nursing hangovers and trying to cure them by watching nature documentaries.

He must have seen her shoes, those awful boots with too-high heels.

“No one,” Kylo answered.

Hux just shook his head. “Just don’t do it again if you’re not serious.”

That was easy enough for him to say, thought Kylo. The distant breakfast setting surfaced in his mind, but he let it go in favour of watching a lion tear apart a gazelle.

 

-=-

 

Rey didn’t want to see him at Christmas. She wanted to come home, see her friends and parents and dog, but not him. Something that Casterfo had told her had forced her to make the decision, he reasoned. Her letters told him how much it hurt her and how she was afraid for him, but that it was something that she needed.

It was an unnecessary distance. But it kept helping her get better, he had to keep accepting it and letting himself be washed forward in the undertow.

He had mostly coursed through the semester. He missed days by just wanting to stay in bed; that hadn’t happened since high school. His grades weren’t where they should be, but he could do better and more next term to recover. He was mostly taking full-year courses. He had to be better and more focused. Rey’s last letter had reminded him of that; she was excelling, liking what she was learning. She had friends. He was walking around like a ghost, waiting for someone else to swoop in and fix him when he was the only one that could do it.

Going to Florida and seeing Poe’s family for the first time since the funeral would hopefully help him onto the track that he needed to follow, one that led away from him.

The semester had been hard. He’d constantly run into Poe’s friends and he’d have to avoid them until it hurt too much to keep his panicked actions under control. He said hi to Allison one day and agreed to go for drinks. He got drunk and made an advance on her and she struck him in the face. He deserved it. And at least they stopped trying to talk to him. Maybe he should suspect them after all.

Packing a bag and going to Florida for Christmas seemed rational when he started making the plans but now, standing in the airport and waiting for his cab, none of it made sense. In his suitcase were gifts that he’d found when he went through their things long ago, when he was packing or looking for his journals. Poe must have found something special if he was already Christmas shopping in the spring. But there were packages for his brothers, his mother, and him. All of them were wrapped; they had one roll of Christmas wrap in the house and he must have used up the last of it. And since Poe couldn’t keep a secret, or at least one that excited him, Kylo felt the weight of the gift to him press heavily on his chest when he’d first found it and now was steadying himself in preparation of opening it.

The last thing that he’d ever get from him was about to be undone.

He’d been gone for more than half a year.

The distant fights and arguments had faded long ago. Sometimes, he’d pick one and look back at it and laugh at how irrational he’d been.

Poe would have been enraged at the handful of times he’d had drunken sex with Liza. Everyone would be if he’d told them. He’d pick weekends when Hux would be away with Paige and call her. She kept calling it friends with benefits, but for him it was more of having someone to fuck who he did not care about. It made him feel disgusting, but did it anyway. After the last time, he deleted her number, determined for it to be the last fucking time. He’d rather jerk off while imagining having sex with Poe instead. But even those memories were fading with time. The smell of his hair, the feeling of his lips, the smoothness of his hands…it was all getting distant.

Maybe he was going to Florida to say a final goodbye, to put the past to rest and let him go.

It was a terrifying, awful thought.

But Poe would have been proud of him. He was always telling him to let go of things that hurt him, put them in context and think about why he was still carrying around such pain and hurt. They’d have talked about it, rubbing feelings raw.

He didn’t want to shut off his heart, but he had to.

So on Christmas day, he watched Shara, Nicky and Freddie open the last gifts from their son and brother, surrounded by other, loudly chattering family. The boys still weren’t old enough to understand what had happened, but they’d at least have the hand-carved figurines of a lion and a tiger to remember their brother. Shara quietly wept at the shawl. When Kylo saw the gifts, he realized when Poe had bought them. There had been a craft sale on campus the week before he died, some place that Kylo thought people would just be selling sticks that were pasted together and spray-painted with glitter. Poe had accepted his excuse of staying home and sleeping too quickly. That was the reason.

His hands were shaking as he took the card off the top of the package and set it aside. He had to save it to read when he was alone. No one would have cared. There were a dozen people there and he was ungodly uncomfortable.

The only one watching him was Shara.

He unwrapped the box and opened it. Inside was another wrapped box.

He both wanted to laugh and cry as the boxes grew increasingly smaller until he got to the last one.

It was a pen box, not ring-shaped but his heart leapt. If it were the ring, then he’d have his answer. He could accept that Poe wanted to give it back to him and was trying to let him go. Logic fled his brain as he snapped it open.

Instead, it was a black pen with his name engraved on it. It was a light, but still well-made pen.

After dinner, he could finally slip off to the guesthouse to read the card. His head ached from speaking _only_ Spanish the entire time. They were either treating him like part of the family or trying to alienate him. He’d already decided that he didn’t belong there. He’d done the last thing he’d have to do for Poe and that was give his brothers a last glimpse of who he was: someone who was loving, caring, filled with both a joy for life as well as an understanding of its darkness. If they ever tracked him down one day, that’s what he’d tell them.

He had to sit on the same bed that they’d shared those years ago, when he’d stupidly pressed that they have sex without understanding how he’d end up feeling.

He opened the envelope, taking a shaky breath.

The cover was just red and white stripes. That’s what happens when a person goes Christmas shopping when it was almost summer, he thought with a slight smirk.

Written in the usual, messy handwriting he tried to take in every word.

_Merry Christmas, Ky! Yeah, I’m writing this and you’re sleeping beside me and it’s almost summer break. Maybe I’ll buy you a new card the week before Christmas and toss this out, but right now I’m feeling pretty good about almost being done with Christmas shopping!! I didn’t find anything for Rey but we usually pick those out together. This year will be even more important. I know that you’ll fix this. I believe in you. Anyway, I love you so FUCKING much and can’t wait to drive you nuts over planning a wedding. Maybe we can use this to write the invitations? Or maybe we just elope and have Rey be our witness? You hate it when I ramble but I can’t wait to spend the rest of my life with the both of you (when she stops hating me of course but whatever). You’ve actually got a lot of love in you and I’m glad I can have some of it. Whatever forever means, I’m glad I’m a part of yours. LOVE, Poe._

There it was: the last words that he’d ever read for him on a flimsy piece of cardboard.

He set the card aside, and breathed in and out.

His father was right. George was right. Even Rey was right. Moving on wasn’t about forgetting, it was about living a life filled with the right choices that he’d learnt how to make because he remembered.

He’d taught him that he was capable of loving someone, but also how he could use someone.

Even if he never fell in love again, he had to respect those lessons and keep working to be better.

 

-=-

 

Going to see George in Virginia over spring break turned out even better than he’d imagined. Kylo could show him his progress, how his grades were improving steadily and he’d already found a supervisor for his thesis in the fall. He’d be taking spring and summer courses so he could graduate early and apply for Masters programmes early as well. Hux was graduating, but had quietly agreed that having a post-graduate degree was something that he wanted as well. His father was back in his life, turned soft by a new wife. If he did a post-graduate degree, he’d have an excuse to stay far away from him for a little while longer.

He’d also fled to Virginia to escape Hux. He finally caught him cheating a week ago. It was one of his TAs, a girl in her late twenties. He’d come home after a lecture was cancelled and saw them. Hux didn’t even bother to beg him not to say anything. He put his head down and accepted what he was doing was wrong. Hux did the right thing and told Paige. But Paige had been in New York at auditions, crushed and alone.

Now, on spring break, they were trying to work it out. And Paige needed his bed.

Now, he was sitting with George at a pub frequented by FBI agents and he felt like he belonged. He was away from tearful exchanges, shouting and then proclamations of love. Only to have it crumble under the reminder of betrayal only to start over again.

It was a bunch of mostly men with loosened ties and neatly cut hair, drinking beer an unwinding after a long week.

“Right, the Detroit case,” George was speaking to another agent who’d joined their table and Kylo finally turned his ears towards the conversation and out of the past, “once we knew where the girls had been taken from, it was only a question of waiting for the DNA. We had samples from the employees, but also knew who had access to the dumpsite. With multiple victims, there had to have been planning.”

Kylo nodded. “It was the guy who worked nights at the store, right?

Kylo had been thinking about the case on the trip there. He had put out the statement with more confidence than he actually felt and was nervous for the response.

George actually sat back and laughed. He tossed his head back and gripped his shoulder. “It was! I can’t remember if I told you or not…”

“You didn’t.” Kylo grinned, turning his glass in his hand. “I’m just thinking. Someone who works nights probably knows where to go during the day where there won’t be much attention. He lucked out with the first one and then kept going. Once you start killing, it’s hard to stop wanting that rush and release. It only just clicked now because I’m not a mess, so…”

The other agent, Callum, shook his head. “Why were you a mess?”

He blinked. He kept forgetting that there were other people in the world that didn’t know who he was. “My fiancé had just been murdered and my uncle was forbidding me from talking to the girl who I rescued when I was fourteen. It was kind of fucked up.”

Callum looked from George, back to him, then again at George. His blue eyes grew wide and he shook his head out of shock. “This is him? The Snoke case? I thought this was your son or something. Holy shit, we studied that in the academy! I always thought, I don’t know, that you’d be strung out on heroin or something after all of that.”

George gave Callum a cold look and the younger agent’s grin quickly faded. “Where does that conclusion come from, Agent Gerd?”

Swallowing, the blond man gave him a briefly sympathetic look before opening his mouth. “Well, statistically speaking, we only didn’t catch him sooner because he was always moving, changing ages and genders and never really having a preferred victim. And the fact that most children are abducted by relatives, not reclusive, rapist weirdos who fuck up starting a kid cult because he can’t stop killing them. There was no pattern there, nothing that matched with what we know. So, I was just balancing out the wrong stats with the right ones: most people who survive a mass trauma event as the sole survivor don’t come out the other side looking so hot.”

Kylo took a long drink, eying the other man, as George folded his arms. “I was determined that he did not become one of those statistics, Cal.”

“So, not like Springfield?” Callum must have been drunk or out for a death wish, challenging a senior agent like this. Kylo quietly squirreled away how to act and not act in the back of his head; it would be good for him to know how stubborn he could be in the future.

George’s expression didn’t change. Kylo had read about the Springfield case. It was one that George had worked on only a year before being handed his disappearance, along with the other possible cases linked to similar circumstances across the country. But didn’t Springfield end positively? Given the information that he’d just been handed, it was beginning to sound like it didn’t.

“Springfield is what made me the type of agent I am. Losing the twins because they didn’t get the help that they needed taught me that our jobs don’t stop when we go home.” George gave Callum a hard look and finished his beer. “Kylo, another round?”

He shook his head. “I’m good. Thanks, George.”

Left alone with Callum, Kylo focused on the other young man. “Why did you say that to him? It was just going to upset him.”

If he asked a question, he might get an explanation, both for the other man’s actions as well as what happened. He leaned in closer, hoping to get some secrets. As he moved, he watched as the other man mirrored his actions. He was attracted to him; the hairs on his arms stood up at the sudden realization. It was the first time in a long while that he noticed the tiny movements that betrayed desire. It would have frightened him long ago; now, he slid his food across the short distance between them, settling it between Callum’s shoes.

When the feet narrowed, trapping his between them, his heartbeat quickened. He wasn’t going to sleep with him, no, but being right was an even bigger rush.

“He’s about to get a promotion,” Callum said, leaning closer. “He’s going to be my boss soon so I wanted to get a few more digs in. Do you want to know what happened with the kids in Springfield?”

Kylo let his hand fall off his mug to brush Callum’s before returning it to his glass to take another drink as he nodded.

The agent’s eyes seemed to shift, darkening. He had him now. “They were the only survivors from some death cult. I mean, if you read the case report, they were screwed from the beginning. They’d been indoctrinated and then dumped with foster care. They got kicked out because they were fucking each other when they were like fifteen or something. And where do kids on the street end up? Hooked on drugs or dead. I think that George tracked down the girl a couple of years ago and she’s just gone. He had to take a month off after that. The rumours are that he’s helping the Snoke kid — _you_ — because he lost them,” Callum paused to wink at him. “Just don’t let him know I told you that.”

The words made Kylo rage inside, but instead he just smiled. “Of course not.”

 

-=-

 

In the cab home with George at the end of the night, after viciously flirting with Callum the entire evening fully knowing that he would never go home with someone like him, he sighed openly at how good it felt to have so much more information. He was awkward at times, but had managed to be mostly charming.

“I saw what you were doing.” George’s voice broke his good mood. “That was very good.”

Kylo thought he was about to be reprimanded, but still dared to grin in response. George smiled too and he relaxed further. “He was an idiot. Who knew surviving a serial killer and having a dead fiancé would turn someone on so much.”

George nodded, but then licked his lips. “I’m not the best person to give relationship advice, Kylo, but…”

“I just wanted to know more about the cases. He gave them up too quickly. That’s all that was.” He shook his head instantly. “If the only real relationship I have the rest of my life is with Rey, then I’d be happy.”

George gave him a long look, the one that meant he’d probably figured something out that would take him years to realize. “Then I won’t push it again.”

 

-=-

 

Kylo didn’t know where to go on the anniversary of his death.

So he went home.

He’d written Rey a long letter about his memories from the day. Her reply hadn’t come yet. He’d waited until the last minute to go home, just in case the letter came.

He tried to have a balance between the two parts of the day: finding Poe and then his fear for Rey. Both still bled together so it was hard not to know where one started and the other ended. But Rey ran away, searching for attention as he tried to push her away. As he continued to push through his wallowing, he knew that he’d depended too much on the both of them in different ways.

He’d never thank Luke for it, but he was learning to be alone. He was far from succeeding in it, but it was at least a process that he’d finally forced himself to start.

He was twenty-two and was bracing himself to keep restarting his life every year until the end of time because he’d keep screwing up whatever progress he’d made.

They’d grown closer through letters. He’d ask more about her feelings, trying not to take up so much space. He tried not to give advice, only replying honestly. He used tools that he built in class and through therapy. Now that Hux and Paige had almost fixed things, he was closer to them too. He’d even made friends with a few people from class and others from the gym. He wouldn’t say that he was close to any of them in particular, but it made getting through the days easier. But writing to Rey, seeing how her handwriting was improving and her thoughts were clearer now, got him through the darker days.

He knew that she had a crush on one of the boys there. He saw it in how she described her feelings for this new boy. They oddly mirrored his earliest thoughts about Poe; he had wanted to keep this kind, trusting person in his life and make him happy.

Jealously came easy as the letters included more and more about this boy. He was even more thankful that he’d deleted Liza’s number. Sleeping with her again just brought a bad taste to his mouth and made him want to throw up.

Sitting with his parents after dinner, he shook his head. “Sometimes I still drive to the old apartment and just sit there. My therapist makes me write down every time I do so I can spread it out more until I stop. I haven’t done it for a while. But today I did.”

Leia leaned over and took his hand. “I still go downstairs and check his room for laundry.”

Han chuckled to himself and Kylo narrowed his eyes. “Oh, I was going through the liquor cabinet the other day. I found a note from him in the back. _Hey Han, your jokes aren’t funny. Guess what’s missing? BYE._ I still can’t figure out what he took.”

“We hid it in the garage.” Kylo surprised himself by smiling. “There’s a bottle of whisky behind the bag of fertilizer.”

“When…when was this?” Han sat back, seeming impressed.

“I don’t know. When I was seventeen or eighteen? It was his idea.” Kylo enjoyed reliving the memory of teenage idiocy. “We both took like a mouthful and it was awful. So he decided to hide it instead.”

All three of them were in the garage, looking for the bottle before he knew it. He reached down, remembering how much smaller his hand and body had been when he’d help Poe tuck the bottle in the back of the storage cupboard. It was harder to manoeuvre now in the tight space; it was also harder because Poe wasn’t poking around beside him, asking what everything was in there.

When he’d fished it out, he started laughing. It was still there, untouched, dusty and half-full.

“Guess I need to clean the garage more often,” Han offered him a smile and folded his arms.

It was strange to realize how many other people were grieving him. He’d been blinded by how much his parents actually cared for him. Leia had finally started changing the room downstairs, making it look more like a guestroom and less like a bedroom for a boy who was never coming back, but it still held his echoes.

So they sat down there with three glasses and just talked, reliving old memories. Poe taking Rey trick-or-treating every Halloween until they moved out. How she’d slept in his bed when Kylo was in Virginia, making sure that he was okay. How every Christmas, he’d try to get them to make different things. How he gradually accepted that the people in that house loved and cared for him and then turned more into himself: eating cereal directly from the box or leaving dishes everywhere. Kylo wished that Rey were there too, to hear her memories and thoughts. He wasn’t sure what he’d read in her letter, but it would be something to add to the collection of remembrances that were slowly becoming less painful to go over.

“Well, boys, I need to get some sleep,” his mother finally stood and said. There was a great deal left in the bottle. “You two can take care of that. One last gift from him to us.”

He didn’t want to cry, so he just nodded.

Instead, he moved to sit against the headboard. Sensual memories blossomed across his mind in the motion and he felt himself blush.

Han settled beside him, filling his glass. “What are you thinking about now?”

He swallowed the entire shot. “Personal stuff between me and him.”

“So, that time in the kitchen?” Han looked at him with raised eyebrows and Kylo’s entire face burnt.

It felt so long ago, but it was really only four or five years. Poe had cut school; Kylo had followed him home. That was when the stalking had started, but he wanted to push that aside. Instead, he recalled how they’d had sex on the kitchen island. And then when they came back downstairs after showering to finish cleaning up all of their clothes, Han was sitting at the kitchen table with the hand towel that they’d used to hastily wipe each other off before realizing a shower was the only solution. If Poe hadn’t been there to talk him through the awkwardness and pure shame, he’d never have wanted to have sex or touch him ever again.

“That was my fault,” he said, quietly. He lifted his glass and accepted another refill. “He was having a bad day. I wanted to make it better.”

Han sighed. “When I first came in, I just heard the two of you talking while I was taking off my shoes. How you both talked each other through it. I had no idea what was really going on until I peaked around the corner and then got out of there. It took us a long time to learn what you really went through and how terrifying it all must have been. Whatever he did to help you get through the harder parts, I didn’t thank him enough for. So I just sat on the porch and let the two of you have your, um, moment.”

“We still probably shouldn’t have used the good hand towel.” Kylo tried to joke, to avoid thinking about this with his father. It was not his proudest moment. Reframing that afternoon, it wasn’t as romantic as he first intended. He’d just taken off from school, realizing that Poe wasn’t in class. He found him asleep on the couch, looking miserable. He just meant to make-out with him, show him that he cared and that things were getting easier for him. Poe had pulled away slightly, asking for more than just touches: he wanted to hear that he cared. He’d really only been living at the house for just under two years at that point. He should have been able to come home, relax, and not be coerced into sex in the kitchen, and then have to pick up the pieces after his boyfriend gets scared off from the subject again. He’d never know how Poe really thought about that day because they let it fall away, not really discussing it again.

He had been beyond terrible to him. Even with the good days and softer, beautiful moments, and no matter what his father was saying, he’d never given Poe the space that he needed. And then he gave Rey too much space in the same breath. All of the explosive fights ended physically because that had been his solution. Poe was receptive because all he wanted was to be cared for and only knew damaged and hurtful relationships as reference.

The thought chilled him. He’d been lying to himself again, desperate to get what he wanted while not realizing what it actually was.

Still, Han was talking, not noticing how his head had dropped. He probably thought that he was just embarrassed.

“Yeah, that was probably a bad idea.” Han was slowly sipping on his drink. “I’m sorry he’s gone, son. But you’re almost back on your feet. There’s still a long way to go, but you seem better. When do spring classes start?”

“Couple of weeks. After convocation. I need to be there for Hux.”

Han had said he was not good, but better. He’d take it. It seemed like the entire time that he’d spent on the outside had been getting better but never getting beyond it.

They talked a little about school until Kylo’s head was starting to spin as his version of the relationship started to unravel.

“Was I ever good to him?” The question made his lip quiver. “Will I ever be good to anyone else?”

Han tilted his head, swallowing hard. “We didn’t see everything that happened when you moved. But when he’d call and talk to us, he’d be frustrated but still tried to be understanding. He talked…a lot about how you follow him. If there was anything that we could do. But he’d always change the subject to something happier and then just talk about nothing. We should have done more to talk to both of you about that.”

“But you did,” Kylo answered, his eyes dropping. “And I didn’t listen. Why did I need to be around him so much?”

Han gripped his leg but he didn’t look up. “Don’t be so hard on yourself. We thought that having things stable at home, going to therapy, that all of you would work through it. We sure fucked that up. We let you all down. That’s why, even though I hate it, I’m _accepting_ that having Rey be away from you has helped you turn things around. Even though it’s taking time.”

“It’s…it’s working. I’m working on it. I have more friends now. I do more things. I write to her all the time and she’s…she’s doing better without me than she ever did with me.” Kylo sighed, letting his own words sink in.

“You’re still with her, helping her,” Han reminded him. “You got her out. That was the first step. What happened along the way, we all messed up too.”

“He never messed up with her, other than by being with me.” Kylo looked down at the hand and finished his drink. He toyed with the empty glass, trying to untangle his crooked thoughts. “It hurts more knowing that I can’t fix it with him. But George told me that I can, at least, learn from it. My therapist says the same thing. I’m still terrified that I just taught Rey how to only have bad relationships. I lied so, so often. They both got so mad at me and were afraid for so long to tell me that I was fucking wrong.”

“That’s us too.” Han filled his own glass and then Kylo’s. “Did I tell you that I’m retiring next year?

“If you did, I wasn’t listening.” Kylo raised his glass to cheers his father’s. “I’m sorry.”

What else was he supposed to say?

“That’s another good memory. You and him when I got that promotion that I didn’t want, but took it anyway so I could have more time off for Rey. That threw the rest of those hard-asses for a loop. Your son and his _what_? _Who_? Jesus Christ, the looks on their faces when you kissed him…” Han’s words were slurring, but Kylo still grinned at the memory. “Fucking beautiful.”

He was biting his lip, still smirking and Han rolled his eyes.

“So, there too?”

“Yeah, I mean…we were gone for a while…” Kylo trailed off. “I realized that I really loved him that night. Twisted and stupid like it all was.”

“This is all…more complicated than I realized. Sorry for not…prying more before.” Han’s voice deepened, his discomfort growing as he slipped into actually being drunk.

The alcohol was finally hitting him too. “Even if it was like, fucked, or whatever, he knew I loved him right?”

“Of course he did. That’s what he’d always say. And what we’d always see. I guess we missed the other things.” Han finished his glass and offered the last of the bottle to Kylo. He accepted, wanting to already forget this night. “The fact that he’s a boy never really mattered to us. He brought out good sides of you that we’d thought we’d never see again. I guess you both made mistakes with your feelings, but that day in the kitchen, I only listened for a few seconds and it made it clear that you two had something special. I’m sorry that it’s just memories now.”

And those memories were easier to deal with. He understood them better now. He still thought about him everyday, but the tears didn’t come as often. It was a dull bruise that he’d only press on when he was too lost in his own thoughts.

“But I think that it’s a good idea to give yourself more time.” Han sucked down the last drops from his glass and set on the bedside table, pushing himself to stand. He stumbled slightly and shook his head. “Maybe…maybe when…maybe. Okay, you want my advice? Don’t date anyone for a while.”

Kylo squinted then nodded. “Do you need help getting up the stairs?”

“No, it’s fine. I’m perfectly fine.” He watched his father steady his hand on the doorframe. This year had taken so much from them too and he had avoided most of it. Still, Han shook his head. “Goodnight, Ben.”

“Goodnight.”

He had to sit and blink himself awake for a few minutes, trying to untangle what his father had just said to him. The room was still familiar, but he saw the layers of how it used to be. The different posters and different figurines—mostly sports and music—CDs and DVDs, books and everything else that had been packed up and either sent to Florida or lingering in storage. He hadn’t let Poe bring many of his more childish things. He was always trying to make him into a different person and by the end he had.

He settled for flopping over and gripping the opposite cover until he passed out, still desperately reaching for him like he always had even when he’d just started letting go.

 

-=-

 

Paige insisted that they go out. But that it would just be her and Kylo.

He was still heavy with realizations from that night with his parents.

It was the week after graduation for Hux, the regular term finally over. There had been an awkward family dinner, Hux’s father and his new wife showing up at the last minute. Kylo sat across from Mrs. Hux and they both glared at them the entire time, earning equally hard eyes in return.

That weekend Paige and Hux would leave for Europe for the summer. Kylo had his schedule full with spring and summer courses and he would have more than enough distractions from being alone.

Paige looked happier now as they continued to work through their problems. During that time, Kylo realized how he’d also taken Paige’s friendship for granted. She had went from being his only friend, to just being Hux’s girlfriend. Even when they’d hang out as couples, he’d work more on talking with Hux or letting Poe’s hand warm his leg.

He’d tasked her with taking care of Rey and had never really thanked her.

So he went out to a dance club with her, knowing full well that he’d _hate_ it.

“I don’t feel good leaving you alone for the summer,” she said, shifting her weight in line to get in. “Do you think that this is all…a good idea? I think that I’m finally over what he did. So maybe I don’t need two months in Europe with him? Maybe we should be here for you?”

Was she trying to use him as an excuse to stay home? “There are things to see there that aren’t him, Paige. And he still wants to be with you. He made a mistake. I forgave him before, when we were teenagers. I still want you to forgive him, but it’s your heart.”

Hux had explained and cried when it all had come undone. Still, they both wanted to make it work. Kylo had been caught in the middle the last few months, finding himself being the shoulder to cry on. Finding empathy in those moments was getting easier. Finding words of advice remained elusive and hard. On the nights that he spent on the couch, sleep was very hard to find.

They ordered drinks inside and found a quiet corner to keep talking, but the music was too loud and made his chest shudder with every bass note.

He pulled Paige closer to hear what she was trying to say.

“…I think I’ve already forgiven him. I’m just still trying to understand _why_.” Paige shouted before sipping her drink. “Why wasn’t I good enough?”

He nodded. “I’m sorry I couldn’t let you know earlier. I saw something was off when I moved in but I was still, you know… _me_ …and I wouldn’t let him talk about anything else. I know he wanted to tell me. And I just kept…mourning him.”

“Kylo, I know. I know.” Paige leaned in closer. “I miss him too. He would have been so easy to talk to about this. He hated cheaters. He hated when Allison’s boyfriend cheated on her. He would have shoved Armie off the balcony.”

Kylo was silent, letting his forehead rest against Paige’s. “Maybe if he hadn’t died, none of this would have happened. Hux wouldn’t have been stressed because of me and I would have been able to talk to him…”

Paige shook her head. “And maybe it would have just happened anyways.”

They shared a few more drinks, trying to find other things to talk about. They finally settled on the girls when they were younger and the games that they’d play. How Rey seemed so perfect to everyone that no one believed what had happened to her. And then Kylo hadn’t been around when it felt apart.

So, they changed to Paige’s job. She still auditioned, but was mostly teaching at a studio in their hometown. His ears burnt when she mentioned running into Liza, but the statement happened in passing. He let Paige talk about how she regretted growing distant from her former friend, and what she must be up to, but Kylo kept quiet, just nodding. He only managed to say how much he disliked her in high school to get Paige to laugh.

Paige seemed comfortably happy and relaxed, taking in her third drink. She looked over at Kylo as he was staring at her smile.

She sat back, broadening her grin. “Come on, let’s dance.”

He’d only danced with Poe a few times, mostly alone in his room or their apartment. Now, he was willingly being led out onto the dance floor by Paige after hastily downing the last of his drink.

It was more just rocking back and forth for him, watching Paige hop and spin to the music. She put her hands on his hips, forcing him closer. She was laughing, singing along to a song that he didn’t know.

He’d neglected everyone in his grief.

Paige’s eye shadow sparkled in the flashing lights, reminding him of one of Rey’s happier drawings as a child when she’d first discovered glitter. He remembered how she asked where glitter came from, if it was from some magical animal that she’d never seen or heard about before.

He was smiling at the memory and Paige grinned up at him, putting her arms around his neck. He rested his forehead against hers, amazed at how strong her body was and how it was still so thin. He could feel the muscles in his back, stroking up and down.

She surged up and kissed him, catching him off guard and he dropped his hands to stare at her in disbelief.

His hands fell to her hips as he shook his head.

She looked up at him and he saw her face break for a moment, trying to hold in tears.

“Why can’t I cheat too?” she sobbed.

Not knowing what else to do, he pulled her closer, letting her rest her head on his shoulder. He breathed in her perfume, how tense her body still was. Maybe it was wrong to want them to still be together. It was the last piece of who he had been and he wanted to cling to it, imagining that they’d all still be together and Rey would still be happy.

He felt her sob and pulled her closer.

Lifting his head, he locked eyes with someone he swore was a ghost sent there to punish him.

It was a dark-haired young man who reminded him so much of Poe that his heart leapt for a moment before it came crashing back down. He had different cheekbones, a different nose. When the lights changed, he could see all that. But the eyes, the hair, they all held him in another face.

Snapping his eyes away, he took Paige by the hand and led her away. He made her get a drink of water, watching her dry her tears.

“I’m sorry,” she said, shaking her head. “Let’s get another drink. I’m okay.”

He didn’t want to, but she looked to certain. He sipped at his coke while she downed two shots. Kylo knew what was wrong, but was letting her give in to the familiar self-destruction that always tempted him.

“That’s enough,” he said, firmly, as she moved to order more. “Let’s get some air.”

“What?”

He took her by the hand, leading her outside.

“Tell me what’s wrong?” He asked. “I think I know but…”

Paige was just digging in her purse. “Do you have smokes?”

“What?” He was still shaking the music out of his ears even as it still thumped in the background. “No, Hux always buys them.”

She rolled her eyes.

“You can have some of mine.” The same young man from before stepped into his line of sight on the edge of the street. “Here.”

He handed Paige two cigarettes and she grinned in thanks, then accepted a light for both. Kylo just watched them interact from his distance of a few paces away, out on the street outside of the club.

He just wanted to go home and forget that anything had happened.

Paige returned to him, sitting down on the curb. He grunted as he sat down, taking the cigarette from her hand.

“I didn’t mean to get upset, to kiss you,” Paige said, taking quick puffs of her cigarette. “I shouldn’t have done that to you.”

“It’s all right.” He took in a long drag and then reached for her hand. “I won’t tell anyone. And I’m fine, Paige. I’m worried about you.”

Paige wiped at her eyes, shaking her head. “Armie still wants to get married. He said that he shouldn’t have asked me so early. He said that he cheated because he was afraid. And the other girl pressured him. I don’t know what to believe.”

Kylo shook his head. “If he had been able to talk to me, I would have told him not to.”

“Ky, it’s not your fault. It’s all on Hux. He said he was grieving too but I…it got so messed up.” She squeezed his hand. “I miss Poe too, but I’ve missed you the most. How it used to be when we were kids. Before you were taken, when we were just small and no one could hurt us. And then you were gone for so long and came back and it took so long for you to be _you_ again. But then you were lost again and we just had to stand back and watch it all. Watch you hurting for him and for her. I was never here and I wanted to be. And now my life is falling apart too and you’re just... helping. I can’t believe that you’ve come back.”

Paige wiped at her eyes and Kylo could only blink then reach over and put his arm around her.

“Why are you thinking about me right now?” Kylo asked. “I’m almost okay now, Paige. I’ll see Rey at the end of the summer. She’s getting better and I’m working hard to be better for her. But you need to decide what you want too, okay?”

Paige weakly nodded and stood. “I’m going to run inside and go to the washroom. Then we can go.”

He was left alone. And his cigarette was out.

Another one was offered to him as he was staring at the burnt filter. “Trouble with your girlfriend?”

The man from before stood beside him, still holding the cigarette.

Kylo was drawn into him, wanting it all to have been a dream. So he took the cigarette and motioned for him to sit down.

“She’s not my girlfriend,” he quickly said. “She’s having trouble with her fiancé. They’re leaving for Europe to try to fix their relationship and it’s all fucked up right now. Thanks for this.”

“It’s no problem.” But his voice was different. The curl of hair across his forehead was in a different direction. “Do you live around here?”

Kylo’s better senses kicked in. “We took a cab.”

“But you go to school here?”

He nodded. “Do you?”

“Yeah, and I’m stuck here for spring classes. I flunked a biology course and I need to make up for it,” he paused to extend his hand. “I’m Leo.”

“Kylo.” He shook the offered hand. His hand felt so different. There was nothing there.

They sat in silence until Paige returned and he had his excuse to go. He flagged down a cab without asking and left his new friend.

 

-=-

 

Paige and Hux decided to go to Europe after all.

Kylo made it two weeks by himself, focusing on his intense course load and writing letters to Rey that he didn’t send, before he wandered back to that bar.

He scanned the crowd, thinking that it was wrong, but his legs still took him there.

When he found the familiar face in the crowd, he knew without a doubt that it was wrong.

He turned around and left, not looking back.

The next few months were about waiting for late August and finally getting to see Rey again.

He didn’t need to write out a schedule, but he had to make one in his head on the walk home.

No more booze, not for a while at least.

Go to the gym more. Physical things could be solved there.

Write to Rey more, even if he didn’t send the letters.

Next, get perfect grades in all of his courses: three in the spring semester, two in the summer. It meant having an almost full course load the entire summer months, but he didn’t care. It would get him to Rey quicker.

But he also needed to deal with all of that: Rey’s letters were consistent, but didn’t come as often as he sent his.

He needed to stop barraging her.

That’s what he had done to Poe.

He couldn’t put her through that.

He promised himself that he wouldn’t write a new letter until he got one from her.

Be more balanced, be more normal.

That used to be all he wanted at first. Then, it was all about being wanted and loved.

Now, he just wanted to shut it all off and focus on Rey for a while in his private thoughts.

It was both the easiest and hardest part of his checklist, he realized as he returned to the empty apartment.

He looked at the wall of his room, all of the evidence that he had outlined about all of the other cases, the abductions and where they had been murdered, all of his suspects, finally focusing in on the death in his own home.

With shaking hands, he took down the papers. He folded each one as carefully as he could, taking out the pins that had kept it in place since he’d moved in.

He had to let it go.

 

-=-

 

He pulled up to Luke’s house in his rental car, almost trembling. He’d made it. The year had passed by at a pace of starts and stops, highs and lows, but it was finally over. Rey could come home now. He’d read the last report and couldn’t wait to see her and know how she’d changed. He didn’t look forward to seeing Luke to the same degree but now maybe he’d have the strength to punch him in the face like he deserved.

He took a deep breath and left the car.

He could at least lift his head now.

His mistakes hadn’t been righted, but at least most of them were behind him now. He wasn’t going back to it. He’d never forget his relationship. In the end, he could learn from it. Until he decided to let someone else back into his heart romantically, he’d still think about all of the rights and wrongs that he’d done. Poe had made his mistakes too; he wouldn’t forget those either. Love shouldn’t be only being desperately tied to another person and he’d always thought that they had figured that part out. In the bitter light of hindsight, he realized that they hadn’t at all. It was still something that he’d always cherish, but he could be better than his past mistakes.

He’d mistreated Poe and he was gone. He was in the past, but there was a future there for Kylo now because he had been there to help him get to it.

Now, right now, he had his chance to rescue Rey again. That could be his part.

It wasn’t like she needed rescuing. Her letters had told him as much. But he had missed her so much. Not just her old hugs and kisses, but he wanted to feel new ones. He wanted to get to know who she was now. He’d had a year to imagine who she was, but needed to get to the real her.

This was what he should have been focusing on all along.

When he left the car, he expected her to be waiting on the porch.

She wasn’t.

Swallowing, he guessed that she was still packing. He rolled his eyes and knocked.

The answer took so long that his nerves finally took over, chewing on his fingernail as he waited.

The door finally opened. Time to show Rey that he’d made it too.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Standard warnings, past references to an m/m relationship. Basically, don't read this if you hated the Poe/Kylo pairing. The Rey chapter will fill in both the holes and the plot developments here to help anyone who skips this chapter. 
> 
> Thanks for the comments. I'm not sure that this chapter is right, but if I don't stop writing it, it will just balloon into dust.


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